131. MyMaine Birth: The Free Birth Society Scam, Nya's Story

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Are you a soon to be mom, a seasoned mother, or simply interested in the world of birth?  You’re in the right place! 

In this episode, we discuss:

• Nya's views on birth growing up and how they have changed since decompressing from this manipulative and controlling community 
• What lead Nya to the freebirth society community 
• The Free Birth Society Scam exposed 
• ….and a whole lot more!

Additional Resources you’ll LOVE…

MyMaineBirth.com 

If you're ready to prepare for an autonomous birth experience, where you’re respected as the authority over your body and your baby…  regardless of where you plan on birthing -  CLICK HERE for 10% off  the MyAutonomous Birth self-paced, online course! 

Not sure where to start?  I’ve got you covered!  Check out my FREE resource, 37 Questions to Ask Your Care Provider.   Whether you’re interviewing new providers or have already established care, this FREE resource offers guidance on important topics to discuss with your provider.

Episode Transcript

Nya (00:00):
And it suddenly all clicked and I was just like, oh yeah,
this whole organization is justnot what they say they are.
It's just as simple as that.

Angela (00:12):
I'm Angela and I'm a certified birth photographer,
experienced doula, childbirtheducator and your host here on
the my Maine Birth podcast.
This is a space where we sharethe real life stories of
families and their unique birthexperiences in the beautiful
state of Maine, from our state'sbiggest hospitals to birth
center births and home births.

(00:33):
Every birth story deserves tobe heard and celebrated.
Whether you're a soon to be mom, a seasoned mother or simply
interested in the world of birth, these episodes are for you.
Welcome back.
You're listening to episode 131of my Main Birth.
Today's guest is Naya, and shehas already shared her two main

(00:58):
birth stories on the podcast.
You can check out episode 2 andepisode 29 to hear her birth
stories, but today Naya's hereto share about her experience
with the Free Birth Society andalso about what her views are on
birth now, after taking sometime to decompress from this
oppressive community.

(01:18):
Hey, naya, welcome back to myMain Birth.
Hi, thank you so much forcoming back and joining me again
as a guest on the podcast.

Nya (01:31):
Well, thanks for having me.

Angela (01:32):
I'm stoked to be here To jump into our conversation
today.
I'd love to have you start bysharing a little bit about, like
what were your views on birthgrowing up and maybe some
stories that you heard aboutbirth when you were younger.

Nya (01:46):
Yeah, so I was born in a hospital and I always knew my
birth story growing up, or likeparts of it, because I was my
mom's first birth and it wasvery traumatic for different
reasons reasons.

(02:07):
Um, I was taught I, my mom, hada birth that was like 20
something hours and I was taughtthat that was unusually long.
Um, now I know that that'spretty much normal for a first
time birth and so that right offthe bat it was like, from the
beginning, your mom's birth withyou was all messed up, right,
like it was wrong, it was waytoo hard, it was not good, and

(02:28):
she talked to me, you know, inmore detail about what the birth
was really like and whatcontractions were like, which I
appreciated, like she actuallyspoke with me in detail about
this throughout my life growingup.
But the big themes of my birthwere that she felt me swaying in
the birth canal and believedthat that was wrong or bad or

(02:53):
dangerous and so they had to usethis suction thing.
It wasn't a vacuum, it was notlike the vacuum machine.
It was back in the 90s.
They had this thing that lookedlike a toilet plunger basically
, and they would like suction tothe baby and then pull the baby
out, and so they did anepisiotomy, they did that, they

(03:17):
did all of those things, but shedidn't have any drugs, so it
was considered a natural birthand I remember growing up
feeling like proud that my momhad a natural birth.
But all of these other thingshappened right, they pulled me
out by the head, they cut my momand they found that I had a

(03:40):
nuchal cord, and so of coursethat's like.
The huge story of my life islike you weren't even supposed
to be alive, like, thank God, wehave the doctors there to pull
you out because of this nuchalcord.
You were going to die blah,blah, blah, um.
And then she had her doctor,was a male doctor and she her

(04:02):
doctor um forcibly pulled herplacenta out before it was ready
and then didn't check to see ifall of it was out.
And so mom and me went home andweeks later, two weeks later,
my mom bled out and passed outon the floor while I was two

(04:23):
week old baby, just on the couchand fainted and lost
consciousness and was likebleeding to death.
And it just so happened that mygrandma walked in and called an
ambulance and her life wassaved.
But she to this day believesthat that was just a fault of
the doctor for not doing theuterine sweep after pulling the

(04:48):
placenta out.
That, you know, after they pulla placenta out, they often will
insert their whole arm into awoman and sweep the uterus for
any remaining pieces of theplacenta, which is just insane
to me, because a placenta shouldnever come out in multiple
pieces if it's being birthednaturally.
And so the fact that that's aroutine procedure is really sad

(05:11):
and it shows me that they wereobviously pulling the placenta
out way too early and and it wasprobably incredibly painful for
her if that's the case.
And so, all of that being said,she, my whole life, was feeding
me the story of like, thankgoodness, you know, thank
goodness for the medical system,when, in reality, I'm able to
look back now and see how, like,the medical system completely

(05:33):
sabotaged her birth.
And so that was like my corestory of birth.
And then, of course, throughoutlife, I'm fed other stories,
mostly through my parents, um,of traumatic hospital births and
blah, blah, blah and um, youknow, we had a conversation once
I remember I was quite young,like in middle school, about

(05:56):
home births.
I don't remember how it came up.
But my mom had a friend who waslike a close family friend who
had lots of kids they're like ahomeschool home birth family and
she had like five kids and oneof them they had to transfer to
the hospital or I don't evenknow if they had to right, but
like they transferred to ahospital during a midwife's
attempted home birth.

(06:16):
And all of a sudden my mom waslike that's the problem with
home birth, like you never knowand like you might have problem
with home birth.
You never know and you mighthave four successful home births
but one of them you might bealmost dying and blah, blah,
blah.
And thank God they got to thehospital on time and so that was

(06:36):
my imprint and my story.
Then my best friend fromchildhood, high school, got
pregnant right out of highschool at 18.
And I was in college on themainland.
We live in Hawaii.
I was in college on themainland when she was giving
birth and she gave birth in ahospital.
But she approached birth in away I had never heard about

(06:58):
before, in a totally natural way.
She labored for a long time andit was not like pathologized.
She moved around a bunch, shewas up and in the shower and in
the tub and on a yoga ball and,like you know, had more freedom
than a lot of hospitals willallow.
They like asked her permissionabout breaking her water and she

(07:21):
said no, and all this stuff andlike there was a lot.
I had never heard of a birthlike that, you know.
And then she started pushingwhile standing up and she like
pushed uncoached and, um, justlike had her baby in a much more
physiological way.
And so, and I remember my momwas at the hospital waiting and

(07:43):
was like freaking out about howlong it was taking, and I was
texting my friend like while shewas in labor and she was like,
yeah, it's fine, like it's justtaking a while.
So that kind of shook me.
I was like, oh okay, so there'slike this whole other world of
birth where birth is like notpeople aren't like afraid of

(08:04):
birth and it can just take along time and you can like do
whatever you want in labor.
Um, I don't really know how Icame to this, but somewhere
along the line, um, I guessbecause in college I got exposed
to more like natural livingprinciples and and I became a

(08:25):
yoga teacher and got really intolike the new age world, which
is full of people livingnaturally and birthing at home
and and eating well and justmore like conscious, healthy
lifestyle living.
That was something that Iwasn't super exposed to growing
up though we always were veryhealthy.
There wasn't this like organiccrunchy life, right.

(08:47):
So I got exposed to that incollege and I got more and more
and more committed to that, tothe point where I remember
having conversations like at theend of college being like if I
got pregnant right now, like Iwould probably home birth.
And then I had a friend incollege who did get pregnant
near the end of college and shehad a home birth with a midwife

(09:09):
and I remember feeling likeworried for her that she was
having a home birth.
Um, but it was an incredibly um, normal birth, except for the
ways that the midwife intervenedand I that was my first moment
of realizing that midwiferycould have been bad in any way,

(09:32):
that, like, middle midwives canalso sabotage birth, and so that
kind of blew my mind and thatfriend I moved away and that
friend sent me some podcastepisodes from the free birth
society and was like this is afriend of mine, they were like
mutual friends, they were closefriends, um, she's like.
This is a friend of mine.
She just started this podcast,um, a couple years ago and it's

(09:56):
really good and it's about womenwho are giving birth totally
unassisted.
And the first episode Ilistened to was a woman who gave
birth to twins and she didn'tknow they were twins.
She didn't have any prenatalcare so she didn't know she had
twins and she gave birth byherself in a bathtub in Costa
Rica and she gave birth to thefirst baby and then was like, oh

(10:20):
, I guess this is the placenta,and the second baby started
coming out and they were bothtotally fine and everything went
normal.
And I remember listening tothat story and being like, whoa,
my worldview is shattered.
So that was before I had kids.
So I was listening to free birthstories before I had kids.
What year did you say?

(10:40):
What year did you say, say,2019, 2020.
Because I got pregnant in thesummer of 2020 for the first
time.
So it was like 2019, like rightas I was leaving Oregon and
moving to Maine, and then I gotpregnant and I told this story

(11:01):
on your podcast before myhusband suggested that we free
birthed and I was like, no, I'mnot ready for that.
So I actually was listening tothe Free Birth Society podcast
throughout that whole pregnancy,but I was specifically avoiding
any episode where it seemedlike the midwife sabotaged the
birth, because I was hiring amidwife and I didn't want the

(11:25):
bad vibes.
What was true is that I didn'twant to be confronted.
I didn't want to be confrontedwith the risk that I was taking.
I just wanted to believe thatmy midwife was not going to be
like any of those other midwives.
So I didn't even listen tothose stories.
Obviously, I wish I had.
Not that my midwife didanything like sabotaging or

(11:47):
anything like that, but it'sclear to me that I was having
some cognitive dissonancethrough that whole pregnancy.
So it was like a slow burntransition.
But I definitely went into myown births with a serious amount
of prior medical programmingthat I was still undoing, and
then also all these free birthstories and just trying to like

(12:07):
reconcile that and and it justtook time.
It really just took a lot oftime.

Angela (12:12):
Yeah, so when did you start thinking about taking the
radical birthkeeper school?

Nya (12:17):
So I I had been kind of like following free birth
society on Instagram and likeconsuming some of their podcasts
.
Then, after I had my daughter,I was like so stoked on home
birth and just like really intoit.
I immediately started taking anonline doula course and I just
took the quickest, shortest,cheapest course I could because

(12:41):
I knew like I'm super educatedon this.
I was doing all my own research.
I don't need to pay a ton ofmoney and do this big, long
school.
I can just get a certificationand start attending births.
And I really wanted to just beat births so I did that.
And that was when I attendedthe two hospital births as part
of my getting certified Um,hospital births as part of my

(13:10):
getting certified Um, and thoselike they went totally normal in
a hospital.
There was nothing likeincredibly traumatizing about
them, but they were traumatizingfor me to witness.
Uh like watching, after havinghad a home birth that was mostly
very, very hands-off and mostlylike very-supported to then see
what normal, natural hospitalbirth looked like.
I couldn't handle that.
So after that I startedre-evaluating and it was

(13:33):
probably within weeks I don'tremember the timeline exactly,
but it was probably within weeksof attending that second birth
that I saw a post on Instagramabout the Radical Birth Keeper
School and I was just like Ihave to do this.
This is where it's going tohappen for me, and I absolutely
would not have done it if Ihadn't gotten the scholarship.

(13:55):
So I got a large part of mytuition taken care of and that
was a huge game changer for us,because we didn't have the money
.
I was still at home with a 10month old baby and my husband
was our only income, so therewas, yeah, that that all I
believe.
I truly believe that, like Godput me in that school, um, for a

(14:19):
reason, and I believe that Iwas meant to be a midwife, a
traditional midwife, not alicensed midwife.
You know what I mean.
So I have a lot of gratitudefor that school and what I
learned there.
I have a lot of gratitude forthe friends I made there and so
much of the personal work anddevelopment that I did there.
I have often credited thatschool and the education I

(14:43):
learned in that school for beingpart of the reason why I was so
comfortable three birthing mysecond child.
I do think that it would havehappened that way anyways, even
if I hadn't taken the school andI would have taken my education
more in like a DIY kind of way,but it definitely.
It definitely kickstarted meonto a certain path that I am

(15:06):
very, very grateful for, eventhough my views of the school
itself and the organization havechanged since then.

Angela (15:15):
Yeah, so you had your beautiful free birth, and it was
shortly after that that youstarted getting a little bit
closer with the Free BirthSociety.
Is that right?

Nya (15:26):
Yeah, so I free birthed.
I have always like ever since Igraduated from the Radical
Birth Keeper School I was alwayslike inching closer to the
inner circle.
I often was the one they wantedto pick for things like public
roundtables or Zoom discussionsor testimonials.
There were opportunities forbeing a leader position inside

(15:48):
of their private membership andI often got picked for those
kinds of things and leadingcalls and things like that.
So I was getting closer andcloser to being an inner circle.
And then, right after we movedto Hawaii so it was like three,
maybe like five months after Igave birth they were advertising

(16:10):
a position for a social mediamanager and I applied and got
the job.
It was originally to be for theMatriarch Rising Festival
Instagram page only, but once Igot in it was clear that my
skills would have been betterused in the Free Breath Society
group and so I shifted away fromMRF into FBS and I still did

(16:34):
work for both, but my role wasalways shifting and growing and
changing because I had a lot ofvarious digital marketing skills
and I think I worked there fora year and a half and in my time
working there I grew to be likea core member of the team.

(16:54):
I was like a go-to person formany, many things and I watched
almost every other staff memberrotate in or out and change
multiple times where I stayed,and then I also watched women
who were in leadership positionsin the membership either get

(17:15):
kicked out or moved out androtated, and again I was one of
the few.
That was consistent.
And I heard throughout thattime a variety of drama stories
about all these different peopleand why they all left for
different reasons and how freebirth society and Emily Saldeo

(17:36):
were always the victim of it andand consistently at the effect
of all of these different peoplesupposedly randomly choosing to
leave, and so that was likeraising red flags for me the
entire time.
Obviously, the turnover rate ofjust employees and leaders was

(17:56):
like alarming and unusual, liketruly unusual for a business
that's successful.
And I've worked with othersuccessful companies and
corporations and I worked incorporate America for a little
while and the turnover rate wasunusual and the way the business
was run was disorganized, tosay the least, and I know I'm
not speaking out of turn sayingthat.

(18:17):
I know Emily Saldana wouldadmit that herself that there
was a level of disorganizationthat was not serving her or
anyone, and that made my jobharder but it wasn't a big deal.
But the red flags stacked overtime and about halfway through
my time working there maybe evensooner I got saved.

(18:39):
I got saved by Jesus and myperspective on a lot of things
really changed.
Obviously, my perspective onthe new age stuff radically
changed, but also my perspectiveon moral issues like abortion,
moral issues like dishonesty,moral issues like feminism and

(19:06):
matriarchy and like hatred ofmen and and things like that all
radically shifted.
And at the same time I startedseeing how on the staff there
was like pretty consistent um,teasing and making fun of and
even hatred towards christiansand women who submitted to their

(19:31):
husbands, and I was both ofthose things and it was like a
in in moments.
There were moments where itfelt like a mean girl club
towards those kinds of people,towards traditional Christian
values, women who submitted totheir husbands, and there was
just this energy of like,growing energy of like oh, I

(19:52):
don't think I really belong here.

Angela (19:55):
That was around the time where you went to Matriarch
Rising Festival, right?
And this is in 2024.
So your time was there as theend of 2023.
And now we're getting into 2024, right.

Nya (20:06):
Yeah, so I went to Matriarch Rising Festival like
the month or the month after Igot saved and I remember leading
up to that, I was supposed toteach a yoga class and I was not
a yoga teacher anymore and Iwas actively renouncing and
rebuking yoga from my life and Iwas just praying and being like

(20:28):
what do I do?
Like I don't want to let Emilydown, I also don't want to miss
this, like it seems like areally cool, beautiful
experience, and like we alreadybought plane tickets and all
this stuff.
So I just said God, pleaseprotect me from any evil or
demonic energy while I'm there,and I really believe the Lord

(20:49):
protected me.
I brought my Bible and I readmy Bible every single night and
I stayed.
I like went to bed early andmissed the largely nefarious
things that went on after darkby both staff and attendees, and
I just kept to myself and I didmy job, which was capturing

(21:11):
social media content.
So I was like on the outskirts,watching but not participating
a lot of times, and when I didparticipate, I felt like God was
guiding me to participate inthe things that I was okay with
and it was amazing I would becapturing content of an event

(21:41):
and then, right as the event wasstarting to get into goddess
worship or talking about othergods or doing like weird pagan
rituals, I would get a text orlike a walkie talkie call being
like hey, naya, like we need youin this area or like we need
help on this thing, and I wouldliterally get pulled away.
Or, like you know, it would belike, okay, I just finished
capturing all the content I need.

(22:02):
I'm going to move on tosomething else.
And then I would see that theywere like doing pagan worship
and I'd be like, oh, good thing,I'm leaving, you know.
So God literally always pulledme away at the perfect time and
really protected me.
I also had some like reallyinteresting moments of seeing

(22:23):
clearly the, the spiritualdanger of participating in a
hodgepodge of random religionpractices and worshiping gods
from other religions that youdon't even really know about,
because it's all spiritual andfeels good and um, and just the

(22:48):
reality of meeting men and the.
There were some serious issuesat that festival with the water,
like the water that I don'tremember exactly what happened,
but like the whole land lostwater, lost all water flow.
At one point they had like apipe issue or something, and so

(23:11):
who do you call to fix that?
Men, right, like that's whoplumbers and electricians are
and everything.
So, like Emily Saldea's husbandand all the husbands of like
the core staff were therehelping set this thing up, and
then they would all like go andhide for three days, but then,
as soon as something seriousthere was, like a serious issue,
we had to call men to come andfix it and, of course, everyone

(23:35):
was incredibly grateful for themen and their help and whatnot.
But, like it was the moment forme of like this is a fake
pretend world that is notreality and it's not healthy and
it's very disrespectful of likewe're just going to go play

(23:56):
matriarchy and play femininegoddess until we need you and
then we'll call you over and youdo what we say and then we'll
send you away again and makewhat we say.
And then we'll send you awayagain and make fun of you and
disrespect you behind your backand act like for three days, act
like single women, act like wedon't have husbands.
There were women walking aroundin clothing or lack of clothing

(24:22):
that they would never walkaround in public with for lack
of respect to their husband andI'm like, okay, I know that
that's not just about other menseeing your body.
No one women or men should beseeing your body like that
outside of your marriage.
And another aspect to this isthat there were like plenty of

(24:44):
lesbian women there.
So like, how safe are youactually in a circumstance where
there are people there who aresexually attracted to you and
you're doing all of this nakedstuff and like twerking and you
know?
So it the the, the veil wasbeing lifted of like this is not

(25:07):
what they say it is and it'snot reality and it's it's um, at
the very least it's a sillygame.
That is, in my opinion, a wasteof time and not necessary for
your health and wellbeing.
It is not necessary for yourhealth and wellbeing-being, it
is not necessary for your healthand well-being to spend three
days in the woods along with abunch of stranger women doing

(25:31):
just pleasureful activities andat the worst it's spiritually
dangerous and a great way to getsucked into genuinely satanic
and demonic practices.
So I kind of walked away fromthat feeling like thank God for
protecting me, but also I don'tever want to do that again.

(25:53):
But I was still on staff withFree Birth Society and there was
already talks about like whatmy role was going to be at
Matriarch Rising Festival nextyear, because I'm like keeping
all this to myself and fear thatI'm going to lose my job, which
paid me very, very well andreally took care of our family,
and so there was like a lotgoing on in me at the time.

(26:14):
Sorry, I just went on like ahuge tangent, but I feel like
that's important.
I had a lot of Christian womentexting me or DMing me, being
like do you think PatriarchRising Festival is safe to go to
for a Christian woman?
And like, okay, it was safe forme.
God protected me while I wasthere, but he protected me by
removing me from thingsrepeatedly.

(26:34):
So, like, do you really want togo into that environment as a
Christian woman?
I would say probably no.

Angela (26:41):
So now, after the festival, that was sort of the
summer leading up to when MMIstarted for the first round and
you were a big part of theircopywriting Is there anything
that you want to share aboutleading up to that, about like
writing the copywriting for whatseemingly was a midwifery
school or at least similar toRBK?
Yeah, so we can skip this ifyou don't want to no, that's

(27:07):
okay.

Nya (27:08):
Um, yeah, it is.
We can totally talk about this.
It just makes me sad to thinkabout um because I believe that
I played a big role in someseriously immoral things.
After being saved by Jesus andafter knowing the difference

(27:30):
between right and wrong, I wasso threatened by and afraid of
Emily Saldea and afraid oflosing my job.
But even more than my fear oflosing my job, just my fear of
like being rebuked by her orarguing with her because she's
such a strong personality whichis amazing in many ways but it

(27:55):
made me afraid to stand up forwhat I felt like was right and
that was in the works.
I was one of the core people whowas like being talked to about

(28:16):
what MMI was going to be, abouthow we set this up.
Um, there were some.
There were frequentconversations around like where,
what direction FBS is going togo.
At one point I had suggestedthat FBS cut all of their

(28:36):
programs except for the CompleteGuide to Free Birth and the
Radical Birth Keeper School andjust go all in on those things,
because those are like the coreof the company and everything
else was kind of extra andunnecessary and so, anyway, that
that, obviously that suggestiondidn't happen but, like I, was

(28:56):
one of the core people that washelping come up with ideas and
being talked to about how weshould go about this, about how
we should go about this.
So when the idea of MMI gotpresented, it originally got
presented as an idea of a roundtwo of the RBK school, like a

(29:19):
level two for graduates.
However, marketing-wise thatwould not go over well because
that limits it to only peoplewho have taken RBK school and
that's a lot of time and energyand money to put into something
that would have a very smallpool of applicants.
So it needed to be made intosomething that anyone could take

(29:41):
but would still present ashigher level than RBK school.
At the same time, I felt thatthere was a greediness and an
unwillingness to let go ofanything that was currently
going on.
So to me it would have mademore sense to just get rid of
the RBK school altogether andsay that, like, this is the new

(30:03):
and improved version.
But that wasn't about to happenbecause of this sense of like
well, this still makes us money,so we need to keep it.
And of course, my job was totranslate those conversations
into appealing marketing for thepeople.

(30:25):
So obviously I knew that theprimary reason why all of this
was happening was to make moremoney, but I'm not going to say
that Right.
So I wrote things, um, like allthe different benefits that a
person would get from doingthese schools and what is the
difference between RBK and MMI,and all this stuff, when truly

(30:48):
at the core of it this was thebasis of all the conversations
was FBS needs more moneydesperately.
And so, like, what can we do tocharge more?
And I'll never forget, like aclear conversation where it was
said, conversation where it wassaid I need to find a way to

(31:17):
make way more money whileoffering way less.
And at the time I felt like Iwas in between these two worlds,
where on the one side, I washearing the Holy Spirit being
like that's wrong.
Since when did we ever, as ahuman species, say I deserve
more for giving less?
That's wrong.
Call it money mindset, call itabundance mentality, I don't

(31:42):
care.
That's wrong.
We shouldn't be trying to getas much as we possibly can for
as little effort as possible.
So much about birth, whochanged my life and who also,
like, helped me to heal a lot ofmy poverty money wounds, so

(32:17):
that I actually was makingreally good money and building a
business that I cared about andall this stuff and was like,
well, she's very financiallysuccessful, like maybe I should
take her, you know, and justlike encourage that.
So I ended up not sayinganything in that moment.
You know, and just likeencourage that.
So I ended up not sayinganything in that moment.
But that was the basis of MMI.
It was how can we make as muchmoney as possible doing as

(32:54):
little as possible?
So the goal was to take was tolike have less and less live
screen time for the teachers,more, um, repeated content and
and all of that.
So there were there was a wholeproject by the staff to like
essentially take the videos andcontent and stuff from the
radical birth keeper school,download them and rebrand them
and then upload them into MMI.
So I knew I was not the onedoing that, but I knew that's

(33:15):
what was going on and I knewthat it was literally just
getting copied from one programto the other.
I also knew that there wasgenuinely other things added to
it, like the mentorship pods.
There were going to be guestspeakers teaching other things.
There was more written contentand stuff like that and a lot of

(33:38):
videos were re-recorded.
But the scripts were reused, soscripts were copied and then
videos were re-recorded with thesame scripts, with a little bit
of changes, you know.
So like on the backend it was anew program but it also took a
lot of copy information and itwas not by any means I don't

(34:05):
think worth the amount of moneythat was charged for it, and I
also, as a mentor, was.
I remember when I took RBK thatlike mentorship thing was just
part of it, and then they forthe next few years took that

(34:26):
part away and then when theyadded it into MMI they were like
here's why we're charging extra, when just a few years ago that
was part of the much moreaffordable program.
So all the while I'm gettingpromised this big paycheck at

(34:46):
the end of my time being a podmentor in MMI and I was loving
doing the mentorship.

Angela (34:55):
But before you became a mentor in MMI, how many births
had you attended?

Nya (35:01):
So I attended the two hospital births and then I
attended four sovereign birthsin person and then I um like
video support long distance fortwo other births, Um, and I'd
had my own free birth in thattime.
As far as, like other ways ofsupport, I did prenatal

(35:23):
education, Um, and so I wasdoing free birth education and I
did, I think, three or fourrounds of my group free birth
education course and I had like10 to 20 people in each round
and I was working prettyintimately with each of those
couples but obviously I hadn'tattended their births at all.

(35:45):
A few of them ended uptransferring to hospital,
basically for personal reasons,but just about all of them went
on with free birth.

Angela (35:54):
I feel like a lot of information and knowledge going
into it as a pod leader, butsome of the other pod leaders
didn't have as much like andthat's when I was like trying to
choose like which pod I wantedto be and I'm like which one has
the most like experience withbirth, you know.

Nya (36:11):
Yeah Well, and also for sovereign births is not a lot
and I've always been, or triedto.
I feel like I've always beenhonest with like I have attended
a handful of births.
I've never tried to posturemyself as, like this, mega
experienced birth attendant, um,but I also know that the

(36:35):
leaders of the whole school werenot actively attending births,
maybe like one a year of like aclose friend and one or two a
year and I.
I worked there for over a yearand a half and there were two
births, one of which two birthsthat she attended, one of which

(36:56):
she didn't get there until likeright after the baby came out,
and they were very casual, theywere like good, close friends.
So like this, like the, Ibelieve that that at one point
in time both Emily and Yolandawere actively attending births
as their primary job, and maybeYolanda, more so than Emily, was

(37:20):
like actively attending birthsfor a long time and has
definitely attended more birthsthan I have.
But all the claims and thewriting that I did about like
we're actively attending, blah,blah, blah, it's not true.
Like I, I, she, she texted herstaff every single time she went
to a birth to let us know ifshe wouldn't be on that day, and

(37:40):
it happened twice in the wholetime I was working there.
So I know, I know that therewas some deception around, like
the experience of the staff ingeneral and the experience of
the pod mentors.
Quite, a few of the pod mentorswere just other members of the
Free Birth Society staff becausewe didn't have anyone else to
do it.
So like there were members ofthe Free Birth Society staff who

(38:04):
had never attended a birth,never had a free birth
themselves, but had beeninvolved with free birth society
for a long time and so theyknew about it and blah, blah,
blah.
But like that, I found myselftaking liberties to my pod group
um, maybe beyond what I wassupposed to like.

(38:25):
I was really supposed to justbe a discussion leader.
Maybe beyond what I wassupposed to Like.
I was really supposed to justbe a discussion leader and I
found myself really takingliberties and correcting people
on things that they were maybelearning from the school and
being like, hold on, like that'snot realistic.
Okay, like I've been to a fewbirths, that is not realistic,
um, and like it.

(38:46):
I think the core issue that Ifelt like in the schools, um,
was that there is, there's.
Whether this was the school'sintention or not.
What was received was thisblack and white of like.
This is what safe birth lookslike and as long as XYZ happens,

(39:13):
there won't be emergencies orcomplications.
Here's like five primaryemergencies that will happen,
that can happen, and what to doin those situations.
But since I took the RBK school, I've heard many, many, many
stories of like admittedlyincredibly rare circumstances

(39:35):
that fall outside of those areas, and so I think the gray needed
to be talked about more and Ithink that that created serious
problems, and I think that thatcreated serious problems.
I also think that they're justthe reality of it.

(39:56):
Being an online school made itimpossible for people to learn
that intuitive gray nuance thatyou really only learn from being
at a birth.
Like.
Nothing can replace the factthat sometimes, when you're at a
birth, someone will just feelthat deep gut feeling of like

(40:16):
something is not right here andwe need to transfer, and that
should be respected, and I don'tlike that.
In the schools, what was taughtwas if you, as the birth keeper
, are feeling that, it'sprobably because you have
wounding and you haveinternalized trauma and you have

(40:37):
a medical mindset and you're infear and you don't trust women,
this whole generation of birthkeepers who are showing up to
births and fully ignoring theirintuition because they believe
that the only way to be at abirth safely is to say nothing,

(41:01):
do nothing, interrupt nothing.
And I have just learned that itcan't be that way, like I thing
.
And I have just learned that itcan't be that way like I.
You know, I, I at a recent birth, I attended, like I followed my
instinct and intuition and Igot to know this mother very,
very well and I felt that attimes she was not moving enough.

(41:24):
I felt that she needed to movea little bit more and she
actually also vocalized thatwhich was great, and she was
like I think I should be movingmore and I don't think it would
have been right for me in thatmoment to be like just do what
feels good, because what feltgood in that moment was not

(41:48):
necessarily what was going to begood for her.
And that maybe that's theoverarching theme here is that
the difference between the newage belief and Christianity is
that you cannot rely on yourfeelings for everything, you
cannot rely on what feels goodfor everything, and you can't

(42:11):
just walk into a birth and sayI'm going to trust this mom to
just do what feels good, because, first of all, birth doesn't
feel good, okay, so like that'sone part of it.
But but there needs.
If a mother is hiring someone tobe at her birth to guide her
and shepherd her, that guide andshepherd needs to be confident

(42:34):
enough in that mother and all ofher unique, intricate, gray
qualities and things that makeher unique and her different,
and what her diet looked likethroughout pregnancy and all
these different things, and thenalso very, very, very
confidently educated in birthand to be able to intuitively, I

(42:57):
believe, through the HolySpirit, only combine those
things to provide suggestion andactual support.
Suggestion and actual support.
And I told my friend whosebirth I was attending I feel

(43:20):
very, very confident in birthand I feel very trusting in
birth.
But if I feel, because that, ifI feel that deep Holy Spirit
nudge, that something isn'tright here, I will tell you that
and I will let you know that Ithink you should transfer
because I think it would bemorally wrong of me not to, and
I think so.

(43:40):
All of that, you know, isstarting to like combine in me
of realizing that the school isis not being presented
truthfully on the marketingfront and I knew that, um, they
are not teaching.
They're not.
It's not possible to teach thefullness of attending a
sovereign birth without being inperson, person, without

(44:06):
actually apprenticing undersomeone, and there was no God.
There was no God.
There was just trust women,trust women, trust women.
And that I'm not saying thatlike you shouldn't trust women,
but I believe that humans areeasily deceived.

(44:28):
They are easily feared out ofand tricked out of and deceived
out of truth, and so I believethat a person should trust God,
not another person as their holycompass, as their holy

(44:48):
guidepost.
And in order to do that, youhave to get right with God and
you have to be clear that thevoice you're hearing is the one
true God, not a pantheon ofother workers of Satan.
So that was like the spiritualcrux of it.
On another personal level, I hadno idea when marketing and

(45:14):
helping create this course, thatthere was a whole section on
abortion.
I felt like that was incrediblyout of integrity for the
message of the three birthsociety, which is all about
preserving life in anon-traumatic way.
It makes no sense to me thatthey would suddenly be
advocating for murdering life.

(45:36):
And that was a light bulbmoment for me of this
corporation is not what they saythey are.
They are not supporters of life, they are supporters of
matriarchy at any cost.
So as long as the woman is incharge, autonomous, gets her way

(46:02):
and doing things, naturallynothing else matters.
And it was around the same timethat nancy lucina released her
story of consciously choosing toallow her baby to die so that
she could free birth, and Ibelieve that that was a very

(46:26):
unique story.
I'm not saying that if yourbaby dies in a free birth, that
you did anything wrong.
Sometimes that does just happenand it happens in all birth
environments.
But in Nancy's story there wasa clear moment of choice where
she very much knew that shecould have gone to a hospital

(46:47):
and they would have had supportsystems to likely save that
baby's life and that's the wholepoint of emergency systems and
she instead chose to birth athome, knowing that there was
just about no chance her babywould survive at home, so that

(47:07):
she could have a peaceful,intact birth experience.
And so I'm reconciling thereality that they are advocating
for and teaching women how tomurder their babies with herbs,
like who cares what it's withright, it's murder for the sake
of matriarchy.

(47:28):
And then they're promoting thisstory of a woman who actively
chose to allow her baby to diewhen she had a clear pathway to
saving her baby and enough timeto do so, and I just couldn't
get behind it.
I just could not get to thatpoint in the curriculum where I
had to leave the discussion onabortion.

(47:48):
I was like this is not going tohappen.
There's no way.
I either I'm going to get upthere and tell my pod that I
radically disagree with what theschool was teaching and risk
being fired, or I'm going toquit.
And then, right at that sametime, the big Reddit thread all

(48:10):
about exposing free birthsociety exploded and, to be
honest, a lot of the things inthat Reddit thread were things I
already knew and was just okaywith.
Regrettably, I had desensitizedmyself to and become okay with
over time Things about EmilySaldana's personality and stuff

(48:33):
like that that were more justlike trash talking.
I was like, whatever, I've beendealing with that for a year
and a half, it's not that big adeal.
And there were things on thatReddit thread that were complete
, flat out lies.
I know that.
I know that for a fact, andthere were things that I knew
through the grapevine that werefinally being publicized and I
was realizing a more whole truthof some of the personal issues

(48:57):
that happened with other womenon her land.
So that was the big final strawfor me was hearing the more
full, deep story of whathappened with these other women
that were on her land or in hercommunity and why they all left
in droves years prior.
And it suddenly all clicked andI was just like, oh yeah, this

(49:20):
whole organization is just notwhat they say they are.
It's just as simple as that.
At that point I had alreadystepped back from my work as
copywriting and doing other workfor Free Birth Society and I
was just doing the MMImentorship, mostly because I was
getting completely overwhelmedand I was working like 70 hours

(49:44):
a week.
Now, granted, I was getting paidvery well, so I'm not
complaining about thework-to-pay ratio, but it was
still too much and the standardswere incredibly high and
incredibly disorganized.
So I found myself crying andfeeling like a failure.

(50:05):
I felt like I was failing thisincredible organization that I
looked up to all the time.
I was getting criticized prettyheavily and the reactions when
I would make mistakes, tinymistakes in the scheme of life
were horrible.
There were a few emails thatwent out with a totally wrong

(50:30):
subject title that I hadn'tgotten approved, or she had told
me to change the subject titleand then I accidentally didn't,
and then the email went out andthe way she spoke to me when
that happened was like if I hadkilled her dog.
You know what I mean.
Like I, she, like the anger andthe annoyance and the

(50:53):
frustration and the belittling.
And then there was always,every time I made a little
mistake like that, which,admittedly, was like somewhat
often okay, like I was notperfect and I made lots of
little mistakes well, whenyou're working 70 hours a week
and you have two little kids, Imean, come on like yeah, exactly

(51:13):
so, like it was, I was notbeing set up to succeed.
in many ways it was just toomuch work.
I was working at like 2am often, and so, in addition to that,
she was like frequently likekind of looming this sense of
like if you can't get thistogether, I'm going to fire you.

(51:34):
And so I was always afraid,always anxious, always like
fearfully submitting to whatevershe wanted, in fear of losing
my job.
Job and because she paid me sowell, that was like even more
scary, you know.
So there were, there were somany elements of that, so I

(51:54):
stepped down from my work and Iwas just doing the pod mentor.
But I didn't quit that becauseI was.
I signed a contract saying thatI would only get paid if I
completed the entire school.
So there was no um like monthlypay or prepay I was giving, I
was committing to a year's worthof work without getting paid

(52:15):
till the very end?

Angela (52:16):
do you think the other mentors, the pod mentors, were
in that same financial situationwhere they all got paid at the
end?

Nya (52:23):
yes, I know that that was the case.
That was the same contracteveryone signed.
So when we all decided to leave, it was novelling that we would
make $0 for the work we'd putin and we were all like, okay,
with that right.
We signed contracts agreeing tothat.

(52:44):
We knew what we were gettinginto and we knew what we were
leaving.
And as frustrating as that isand as selfish and unethical as
I feel like that is on FreeBirth Society's part, I feel
like at least they weretransparent about it and I can
understand from a businessperspective why they would have
done that because they've hadsuch crazy turnover that they

(53:07):
needed to put something in placeto ensure that they wouldn't
lose people halfway through theyear.
But the reason why they havesuch high turnover is because of
all the other issues Imentioned just rampant
personality issues and greed anddishonesty, from what's behind
the scenes to what's presentedto the public.

(53:29):
And money, money, money, moneygreed.
You know what I mean.
So that, like we all, decidedto leave.

Angela (53:39):
We were talking with other mentors during this time.

Nya (53:42):
Yeah, so I came to the decision to leave independently
and I was talking to one otherstaff member who was my friend,
who I kept in touch with longafter she left Free Birth
Society and largely because shewas also coming to Jesus at the
time.
So we were talking a lot aboutthe Bible and things like that

(54:05):
and I was just confiding in herand talking to her about my
desires to leave and she said,well, there's a whole bunch of
other people who are alsoplanning on leaving.
Let's connect you guys.
So I got connected to a handfulof other pod mentors who were
planning on leaving and theythey wanted to kind of leave as
a group all at the same timetime, largely to preserve the

(54:28):
individuals from like all theblame being put on one person,
right.
So like if I left independentlyit would look like I had this,
I had like something wrong withme, right, and there would be
possibly like a social backlashagainst me.
And there were other people whowere significantly closer to

(54:50):
Emily Saldaia and the Free BirthSociety who were very afraid of
what would happen upon leaving.
And so all of us leaving aroundthe same time made that feel a
little less like you know, likethere would be no one person to
blame.
If that makes sense, itwouldn't be like there's one
person spearheading thismovement, and the reality is is

(55:13):
I have no idea how those otherpeople came to decide to leave.
I don't think most of thosepeople had what I was
experiencing, which was thislike long term lead up of
putting various pieces togetherand personal issues like
religious differences and stuff.
Like I.
I left largely because ofreligious differences and

(55:37):
beliefs and they, I think,largely left because of like the
stuff in the reddit thread andlike personal issues that were
coming to light.
But we all decided to leave atthe same time.
There was talks of all sendingsome mass email or something,
and I was like I don't want todo that.

(55:59):
I prayed for hours and I wroteEmily a heartfelt email that
truly came from my spirit,saying I believe what you're
doing here is unethical.
I believe that you're sinningagainst God.
I have some very stark beliefsthat differ from what you're

(56:21):
teaching here and I cannot servemy God while continuing to be
here, cannot serve my God whilecontinuing to be here, and I
believe that on a personal level, you have sinned greatly and I
really, really pray that youfind God, and I pray that you

(56:46):
will always know that you cancome and talk to me if you ever
want to repent and choose a newkind of life.
And I meant all of thatwholeheartedly.
And if Emily ever listens tothis, I still mean that and I
would still do anything to beher friend and supporter and I
would defend her with all myheart and soul if she decided to

(57:07):
truly repent of all sins,personal and professional, and
follow christ and commit torunning her business in a
genuinely ethical way, withserving people, not serving
herself, as the first andforemost priority serving,
serving God, not serving herself.

(57:28):
And I got a pleasant, kindresponse back that was loving
and kind and sweet and sad, andthat was it.
I was, completely, from thatpoint, on no contact.
I did get a lot of peopleasking me questions on Instagram

(57:50):
at that point, and so I endedup blocking all of her accounts
on social media because I justwanted to be able to speak
freely to what I knew and what Iexperienced, without worries
that she was watching me andthings like that.
I know that there have beenlegal action taken against
people who've spoken out, and soI didn't.

(58:12):
I really wanted to just behonest and leave on a personal
note but not not share anythinglike not not share things with
people.
I had a lot of Christianscoming to me and being like do
you think it's worth taking theRBK school?
Or blah, blah, blah.

(58:32):
And I honestly like.
My honest answer to all of thatis I don't know.
I don't know Because one Idon't know how those programs
have changed since I stoppedworking there.
Those programs have changedsince I stopped working there.
The RBK school that I took isnot what it is now, and so while

(58:55):
I can say that that schoolchanged my life and taught me so
much, I don't know if that'show it would be for a person now
.
On another level, I don't knowif it's worth learning all that
in that environment for the kindof world that you'll get sucked
into right.
When the truth of the matter isand Emily and Yolanda will be
the first to say this you canlearn everything you learn in

(59:18):
the RBK school from books.
I mean that so wholeheartedlyfrom books, and like devoted
research and scientific study,but like they don't have access
to anything unusual.
They have worked very, very hardto compile and gather
information and teach it in areally inspiring wonderful way

(59:41):
and obviously live classes andreal mentorship and community
makes it a very differentexperience than just reading
books.
But if you are dedicated,especially as a Christian, to
wanting to serve women in birthor free birth yourself and you
don't want to get involved inall that the free birth society

(01:00:02):
is, you absolutely can learneverything they teach from books
and deep dive personal studies.
And I would always recommend,if you're planning on attending
a birth apprentice under anotherbirth keeper in person, like
attend births with a unlicensed,sovereign birth keeper that you

(01:00:26):
trust, who is a Christian aswell, or whatever, and like let
them take responsibility for thebirth while you witness and
debrief with them, and likethat's how.
That's how real midwiferythey've all you know they always
talk about traditionalmidwifery and passing the torch
and traditional midwifery thatis how traditional midwifery was

(01:00:46):
always taught was attendingbirths in real life with an
experienced, wise woman.
And so, going back, if I couldchange anything about my birth
work journey, it would be thatit would be like truly
apprenticing under someone.

Angela (01:01:05):
Yeah, that's really interesting and so so true, like
you're absolutely right thatthe witnessing and learning from
other birth workers that havebeen doing this longer than us,
like in person, is so important,mmi, I know for me at least I

(01:01:30):
really wanted the information.
It was pretty clear to me thatI was going to have to pursue an
in-person apprenticeship to getthose hands-on skills, but at
this step I really just wantedto get the information.
So I'm so happy that I ended upfinding Wapio's program.
I had not heard of her beforeand I enrolled in February in
her year-long birth keeperprograms, which has all of the
information that I, at least,was hoping for from MMI.

Nya (01:01:54):
I think another aspect to all of this that I haven't
really spoken publicly about isthat one of the biggest selling
points of both the RBK schooland the MMI school has always
been even if you don't want toattend births, we will teach you
how to run a successful onlinebirth business, and I know maybe

(01:02:15):
four or five people whoactually have done that since
doing those schools, and I knowthat a lot of that is because
people don't truly know how totake the things they learn and
apply them in a successful way,or they aren't applying them
wholeheartedly or they justhaven't figured out their online
presence yet, or whatnot.

(01:02:36):
I still mentor people ongrowing social media accounts
and I know that you can give allthe right information in the
world and sometimes people justwon't really do it.
So I'm not saying that that isa fault of them, but I will say
that just about every person whodid grow a successful online

(01:03:01):
birth business was heavilycriticized behind the scenes by
free birth society forplagiarism.
In some cases there were actualplagiarism, like there were
people who literally just copiedthe whole complete guide to
free birth and then resold it astheir own birth course.

(01:03:24):
That is not cool.
I think that's really, reallyunethical and sinful.
But there were also.
The majority of the smack talkwas like oh, we just made this
post all about the placenta.
And then look at this RBK gradover here is now making

(01:03:45):
post-hobby placenta.
It's like, okay, you are in oneof the most specifically niche
industries of all time.
You are the leading successfulperson in it and you are making
money off of teaching otherpeople to do exactly what you do

(01:04:07):
.
And now you're getting mad thatthey're talking about the same
topics you you talk about, butthere are only so many things to
post about.
If your niche is free birth,you know what I mean.
So like there was this.
There was this disconnect oflike we need to make as much

(01:04:28):
money as we can off of teachingother people to be little
versions of us, but then we'realso going to get increasingly
protective and fearful and angrywhen they actually succeed.

Angela (01:04:42):
It's like when they did the directory the directory.

Nya (01:04:54):
Yeah, and I was also in great influence during the time
that that was being created andI very much understand a paywall
, mostly because that programwas not set to make hardly any
money and it costs a lot ofmoney to create a program like
that.
They had to hire custom appdevelopers to develop that
website and they had to pay allof their staff to work on it all

(01:05:15):
the graphic design so they hadto make some kind of money on it
.
So I understand that and I alsounderstand that, with the truly
sensitive nature of being anRBK, you need to protect your
information from being seen byjust anyone.
And some.
Karen, whose whole desire is togo on a website like that and

(01:05:38):
get RBK information and reportthem, isn't going to pay money
to do that.
She's going to see a paywalland be like man.
It's not worth it.
But if it's free, then suddenlyanyone can go in there.

(01:05:59):
Anyone who has an issue withbirthkeeping can go in there.
I understand that.
I still think that it's yetagain another instance like
let's just find more ways we canmake money and position it as a
service to the community, when,especially when, all of these
new additions to their businesswere things that they once

(01:06:23):
convinced people they didn'tneed.
So, like when they were justselling RBK school, they
convinced people that theydidn't need a full year long
midwifery program.
They can just do this 12 weekRBK school convinced people.

(01:06:51):
I remember them saying this inmy RBK school like you don't
need to even have an onlinepresence, you don't even need to
have a website, you don't needto be listed anywhere.
Like just build community inreal life, do your village
prenatals, do your women'scircles, and like that's how the
work will come.
And that was true for me.
Like I was never listed on adirectory and I was always
getting business.
And then all of a suddenthey're like but here's the

(01:07:13):
directory and like here's whyyou need it.
So they there's.
There's a lack of long-termvision in their marketing plan,
obviously, and they have a verydevoted following who has been
watching them all this time andI think honestly, like their
following just started puttingthe pieces together of you

(01:07:33):
haven't been honest with us.
You know, you, you, you.
It's one thing if you're somebig white collar corporate, wall
street person and everyoneknows you're going to be
dishonest because your wholevibe is just making money.
It's another thing when you'relike I am a spiritual lover of

(01:07:55):
women, I love babies and women.
I care for them deeply.
I cry when they're hurt.
I do this work because it'shumanitarian and I don't want to
see them hurt but then you'relike consistently lying to your
audience all along to make money.
That's even scarier than likethe Wall Street tycoon, in my

(01:08:20):
opinion, because that is likeborderline psychopathic or
sociopathic.
It's very, very strongcognitive dissonance.
For someone who who, um,teaches and preaches about
cognitive dissonance a lot, youknow it's scary.
And while I don't think it'sright to necessarily like call
free birth society cult and Ithink that that's like kind of a

(01:08:42):
ridiculous statement, Iunderstand why people use that
word because of the like energythat the leadership there gives
off.

Angela (01:08:54):
So what are your views on birth after leaving?
And kind of decompressing fromall of that, like what are your
views now on birth?

Nya (01:09:05):
Yeah, well, you know it's a great question because this
woman, this friend that Irecently served, was, you know,
my very close friend as I wasgoing through untangling all
this, and she got pregnantshortly after and was like I
want you to be there but likeyour views on birth really

(01:09:26):
changed, and so I was likeactively reconciling all this
while I was helping a pregnantwoman and going to her birth and
I will admit that like thiswhole thing shook me really
badly and I was afraid.
I was afraid to attend a birthbecause I felt like I had been

(01:09:51):
in ignorance in some ways andthat I had all these thoughts of
like, oh my gosh, maybe Ididn't just get lucky, maybe I
have just been lucky that I'venever attended a birth with a
bad outcome, or that I've neverneeded to intervene, or blah,
blah, blah.
And attending this recent birth, where it was just like so
straightforward and wonderful,um, reminded me like, okay,

(01:10:13):
birth does work, birth works.
That is an underlying truth.
God designed the female body tobirth.
You can call it sexist orwhatever you can call it mean to
women who don't have children,but I believe it's true.

(01:10:33):
God designed us as women togive birth and be mothers, and
so there are built-in systems inour bodies to make those things
work, just like he built in ourability to breathe, and no one
is walking around wondering ifthey're too broken to breathe.

(01:10:53):
I guess there are people whoare, you know, people who
believe in things like asthma,but at the same time I see very
clearly now that we live in afallen world.
The earth that God designed forus originally and the bodies
that God designed for usoriginally were fully free from

(01:11:17):
disease and death and sicknessand imbalance.
They were perfect perfectbodies and perfect earth.
When the first sin came intothe world, that sin
energetically tainted everything, including the human body.
It doesn't mean that the humanbody is broken or that God's

(01:11:37):
original design has changed, butit means that our body has the
capacity to get sick and die Atthe same time.
God wants us to preserve life,not by any means possible.
God sent Abraham to sacrificehis own child for the sake of

(01:12:03):
proving his love to God, but Godsaved the child in the end,
because God preserves and caresabout life, especially the life

(01:12:26):
of an innocent child.
By God.
To honor our temple, meaninghonor this fleshy thing that was
supposed to be the house of theHoly Spirit.
Do not fill the house of theHoly Spirit with poison, with
drugs, with fear and anxiety,with toxins, with pesticides and

(01:12:48):
gross things.
Do not let this body get sounhealthy and overweight and
unwell that it literally can'tperform the things that God
designed it to perform.
So, just like in our salvation,god has chosen everything.
He has designed and choseneverything.

(01:13:10):
Everything he has designed andchosen everything.
And we also have aresponsibility to answer that
calling to live up to thatdesign.
And so, yes, birth works.
God designed your body to birth, but he did not say you have
freedom to sin.

(01:13:30):
He said you have freedom fromyour sin, so act like it.
God gave you a body that willbirth, but you need to be free
from your sin.
You need to commit to honoringthe design that God made.

(01:13:52):
Now don't hear what I'm notsaying.
I don't think that means if youhad to transfer that like or
like if you did have a genuineemergency in birth, that like
that means something is deeply,forever wrong with you.
But I do think that there isalways a root cause that can be

(01:14:16):
addressed and it's our job totry to address those things,
especially if we want to freebirth.
So if you want a free birth,you want all the benefits of a
free birth.
You have a responsibility toprepare yourself for a free
birth.
I don't think that thementality of like all you have

(01:14:38):
to do is just wait and thenyou'll birth is a great thing to
be saying to people.
I do think that for themajority of cases that is true
right, like I've seen thatfirsthand, that is true.
But also when I look back at myfree birth, that's not really
what happened.
I didn't just like go about lifeand then birth.

(01:15:00):
I exercised six times a week.
I ate incredibly clean.
We were like eating incrediblyhealthy.
During that time.
I drank like raw milk everysingle day.
I was eating so many organmeats.
We were eating kidneys Okay,like we were eating heart and

(01:15:23):
kidneys and liver and like allsorts of crazy stuff.
I was drinking broth every day.
I was taking organ supplements.
I was drinking tons of raw milk.
I was really, really limitingmy grains and my sugar.
So, on a just nutrition level,I was not just living how the

(01:15:46):
average American lives, I wasonly drinking fresh spring water
from the ground.
We had a private well, I wasonly drinking fresh spring water
from the ground, like, okay, wehad a private, well, I was
never even washing my dishes inwater with fluoride in it.
Now I'm not saying you have todo all those things to free
birth.
There are people who live inthe city and eat McDonald's and

(01:16:06):
smoke cigarettes and they freebirth.
But why would you want toapproach free birth that way?
Right, like there are peoplewho sin their whole life and
repent in their dying breath andgo to heaven.
But why would you want to getto heaven having had a life full
of sins against God and thenhave to look up at God and be

(01:16:27):
like thank you for forgiving me.
I see now that I wasted mywhole life and made this really
imbalanced.
You know what I mean.
It's the same thing.
Why would you spend your entirepregnancy risking it and not
taking it seriously under theguise of, well, I'm going to

(01:16:51):
free birth anyways.
So who cares how I treat myhealth and who cares how
seriously I take this?
I think that there's aresponsibility.
You know the free birth societysays this.
When you choose to free birth,you choose radical
responsibility.
That is not light.
That means responsibility ifthere's an emergency.

(01:17:12):
That means spiritualresponsibility against any sins
against God that you commit inthe process.
You know that meansresponsibility to actually make
it work, to actually make ithappen that you everyone should

(01:17:38):
take a strong evaluation oftheir life when they become
pregnant and do what isnecessary to try to free birth.
I believe every single womanshould do that Largely because,
like there's a chance that youmight have to free birth, even
if you're totally medicalized,planning a hospital break,
there's a chance you'll birth inthe car.
So I believe every single womanshould do that and get highly

(01:17:59):
educated on the physiologicalprocess of birth which, like I
said, you can do from books.
I believe that women should gethighly educated on true
nutrition and what actually isrequired for a pregnant,
birthing, postpartum body interms of nutrition and force

(01:18:19):
yourself to adjust your diet,like no matter how hard it is.
I believe that women should bephysically active and fit.
When we talk about, like ourancestors, successfully free
birthing left and right, when wetalk about, like our ancestors,
successfully free birthing leftand right, those ancestors were
working in fields all day andthen they were cooking on their

(01:18:42):
feet in a wood stove, so likelifting firewood on cast iron,
which is like heavy, doingeverything by hand kneading
bread every day, so like, ifthat's not your life, then you
need to exercise.
You can't look at that personand say I'm going to free just
like that person, but I'm notgoing to live like that person
at all.

(01:19:02):
I mean, you can right Somepeople do, but again, why would
you risk it?
So, if you're not living anactive life, why would you risk
it?
So, if you're not living anactive life, you need to get
active, you need to eat well,you need to educate yourself and
, above all of that, I believeyou need to get right with God,
because if you are spending apregnancy worshiping demons and

(01:19:28):
chanting demonic incantationsover your baby and doing
witchcraft and sinning againstthe one true God of the universe
, I would not expect that God,who controls life and death, who
is the only one that controlslife and death, to bless you.

(01:19:50):
Now again, it happens all thetime for reasons I don't
understand.
I was a strong pagan worshiperwhen I had my children and God
blessed me with wonderful,peaceful, easeful births, but I
believe he did so as a means ofbringing me closer to him,

(01:20:12):
because in those births I metGod and I saw God and I knew
this is not a pantheon ofmatriarchal goddesses.
This is a singular God and Ineed to get to know who this God
is.
So that's like my overarchingadvice for pregnant women.

(01:20:32):
I'm not saying saying it'sgonna fail if you don't do those
things.
I'm not saying that you need tohave fear if you're not doing
those things perfectly, and I'mnot saying that like all of a
sudden I feel like you can'tbirth twins at home, blah, blah,
blah.
But I do think it's worth beinga little more realistic about.
Yes, there are some things thatare slightly more risky and, if

(01:20:56):
cornered, emily Saldea andYolanda Norris-Clark will both
say that as well.
But because of their marketingand because of their image, they
really paint a picture that nobirth scenario is really riskier
than another, that twins arejust as safe as a singleton.
No, that's not true.
Twins are not just as safe as asingleton.

(01:21:17):
Your body is still perfectlydesigned to birth twins, but
you've got to know that there isa slightly higher risk of
birthing twins.
That has got to be in yourfield of awareness.
The whole ignorance of thepeople following free birth
society is concerning and Ibelieve it has led to a lot of

(01:21:41):
issues in birth, a lot ofunnecessary transfers and a lot
of situations where transfersshould have happened and didn't.
So I don't have personalexperience with that.
I've never witnessed a birththat needed to transfer.
I've never had a birth myselfthat needed a transfer or needed
intervention.

(01:22:02):
But I think it's worth having ahealthy fear of god.
Right, like we are meant toworship god and fear him because
of his power, I feel the samething about his divine creation
of birth.

Angela (01:22:18):
Yeah, I feel like that's something a lot of women that
share their birth stories on mypodcast are like it brought me
closer to God.
So even if they're like notthere before their birth, like
the birth experience often doesbring them like closer.

Nya (01:22:30):
Yeah, and attending birth will do that for you too.
I've only had one instance in abirth where I felt like I
really needed to pray and like Imean, obviously I pray no
matter what, but like we'rereally needed to talk to God,
and I was having not even fear,but just like a wondering, and I
left the room and I got on myknees and I looked up to the

(01:22:53):
heavens and I prayed and I waslike God, if there's something
wrong, please give me a sign.
You know, and all we receivedwas just signs that everything
was okay and wonderful.
So I think that was like a goodmoment of confirmation for me
that you can learn all you canlearn.
But if you don't have that HolySpirit channel, then like

(01:23:15):
you're missing a big part ofthis.

Angela (01:23:18):
Yeah, absolutely so.
Do you want to share a littlebit about how people can get a
hold of you if they want to?

Nya (01:23:27):
Yeah, no, that's great.
I love love talking to people.
I love sharing information andsupporting women and just like
on Instagram casually inpregnancies and births and
answering questions and whatnot.
I don't actively do birth workanymore so I'm not running any
courses or classes on free birth.
I attend very casually for likea close friend, when the

(01:23:52):
circumstances are right.
I'm in my young mothering yearsso I'm not like trying to
attend every month, but ifsomeone wants to connect with me
, my Instagram is just a freeresource full of information
about birth and naturalmothering and Christian living
and marriage and homeschoolingand just all the things that I'm
passionate about.
But free birth is like afoundation of that.

(01:24:13):
So my Instagram iswholesomehomefront and you can
chat with me there.
I'm always open to talking.

Angela (01:24:21):
Awesome.
I will link your information inthe show notes.
And as a final question I amwondering because, as I'm
talking and like doing theseother podcasts with the other
women from MMI, a theme is thatat the beginning, when we kind
of all started with Free BirthSociety, all of our husbands had
the insight to kind of knowahead of time, like calling BS

(01:24:43):
on the whole thing, and what wasyour husband's like sort of
thoughts on FBS?

Nya (01:24:47):
if you don't mind me asking , yeah, no, I don't mind at all
After I had my first son and Iwas starting to get or yeah, my
first son, my second child, andI was starting to get into some
of those more like leadershippositions in the membership but
I wasn't on staff by any means Iremember my husband being like,
just so you know, I think thisis where your relationship with

(01:25:07):
free birth society should stop,and I was like why, that's weird
.
And he was like I'm justletting you know, I don't think
that it would be right.
I'm just having a feeling.
I don't think it would be rightfor you to become like the
inner circle.
I love that you're learning, Ilove that you have community.
I love that this is a resourcefor us.
Let's leave it at that.
And I think that was greatadvice.

(01:25:32):
Obviously, that's not whathappened.
My husband at the time wasreally trying to build his own
business and he wanted toessentially create a platform
for the husbands of freebirthing women, because
obviously we know that, like,there's a lot of work that needs

(01:25:54):
to be done for a husband thereas well and they deserve support
and love and care and respect.
And so he he reached out toEmily, or I believe at the time
I reached out with my emailbecause I was friends with her,
kind of you know.
So we reached out through myemail and was like hey, my
husband's having this idea andwould it be okay if he did some

(01:26:20):
business coaching calls with you?
He would pay you.
I know you normally only workwith women, but because this
would be so applicable to youraudience, maybe you could do a
coaching call with him.
And then also, do you think Icould post about this in the
Free Birth Society membership inthe Lighthouse and let the
women know to tell theirhusbands to join this thing?

(01:26:42):
It wouldn't be a competingproduct with yours at all.
I believe it would enrich andenhance the experience.
And then, if you ever wanted to, maybe you guys could lead some
calls together or whatever.
We got a one sentence reply fromher assistants saying Emily is
not open to that at this time.
Later, when I was on staff,like years later, she brought it

(01:27:07):
up, kind of laughing at myhusband and to me, and saying oh
, the only reason I didn't replyto that is because I didn't
want to feed into this weirddynamic you guys had where you
were the one reaching outbecause he was too scared to and
I just was like, excuse me, Ithought it was common courtesy

(01:27:32):
where if I know a person, Iwould be the one to reach out to
them on behalf of my husband,just like if he had a connection
that I wanted to talk to, hewould reach out first.
That's just common courtesy inmaking introductions yeah,
normal stuff.
Courtesy in makingintroductions yeah, normal stuff
, yeah.
Plus, I know how busy you are.

(01:27:53):
There's a good chance that shewould just ignore an email from
someone she doesn't know.
So I felt like there were somany rational reasons why.
But then, throughout my time onstaff, multiple other men
husbands of people in hercommunity reached out to her
with very similar ideas notasking her to do any unpaid work

(01:28:16):
, not asking her to do anythingunusual, but just saying, hey, I
want to do something for men.
Can we talk about this?
Can we collaborate?
Because all of these women inyour community have husbands and
, like you, are the onlysingular connection point to all
of them, and every time it wasa total ignore their email,

(01:28:40):
possibly block them on socialmedia and then send screenshots
and laugh at them in our staffgroup text.
Laugh at them in our staffgroup texts, make fun of them,
make fun of men, be hatefultowards men, so like that.
I mean I should have quit whenI saw that, because how awful

(01:29:02):
and disrespectful to someone whois trying to make the world
better.
And we all know that there aremany circumstances where the
husband becomes like a genuineproblem in the free birth.
So why not give them resources?
Why not give them support, likeeven if you're just doing it
for the sake of women and babies, isn't that what free birth
society is all about, right?

(01:29:23):
So there was all along, like myhusband knew this was not okay
and I was getting signs thatlike my husband was right and we
accepted the full-time job withFree Birth Society because we
needed the money.
And my husband was like maybethis is right, blah, blah, blah.
I believe that God guided usthrough that because it was a

(01:29:45):
large part of my salvation andmy sanctification.
But when I finally quit, it waslargely guided by my husband
who was like this is breakingyour spirit, this is out of
integrity for you.
Like I don't want this for youanymore.
And he at the time picked up asecond job so that I could quit
and freed me from that while Iwas still working on, you know,

(01:30:07):
building my, my Melaleucabusiness.
I just on, you know, buildingmy Melaleuca business.
I just I wish I in some ways Iwish I had listened to him from
the beginning on it, because ourmen are direct lines of
communication to God and theyare connected to the Holy Spirit
and they are meant to be ourleaders and they know, and, like

(01:30:28):
any kind of organization, thatis driving a wedge between women
and their husbands.
That's not good.

Angela (01:30:35):
Yeah, I totally agree, and we should all take what our
husbands are saying and reallysit with it, you know, for a
while before we make any rashdecisions.
Amazing Well, naya, thank youso much.
This interview just reallymeans so much to me, and I know
it will to a lot of other people.
Exactly Amazing Well, naya,thank you so much.
This interview just reallymeans so much to me, and I know
it will to a lot of other peopletoo.
So thank you so much for takingthe time to chat with me today

(01:30:57):
and share your story.

Nya (01:30:59):
Yeah, thank you, Angela.
It's great to reconnect and I'malways open to doing something
else if people want to learnmore about something.

Angela (01:31:14):
Before you go, I just want to remind you I have a ton
of resources for pregnancy andbirth.
If you're pregnant, whetheryou're a first time mom or if
this is your fifth baby, I wantyou to check out the show notes,
because I have some freetrainings and free downloads
that you can sign up for, aswell as the link to access my
labor of love, a comprehensive,self-paced online childbirth
education course.
I created this coursespecifically for moms who don't

(01:31:35):
want to be told what to do,regardless of where you're
birthing or who you're birthingwith, and I'd honestly love to
teach you everything that I knowso that you can prepare for an
autonomous birth experience andprepare to step into your role
as the leader of your birthjourney.
So click to the show notes,check out all of those links and

(01:31:56):
, if you ever have any questions, feel free to DM me at my main
birth over on Instagram.