I chat to Ashley Winning, a doula, birth educator, fellow podcaster and mum of 3. Ashley talks about her 2 unplanned c-sections, and why she chose to freebirth at home with her third child. We chat special scars, posterior birth, risks and benefits of an HBAC, and the importance of intuition. It's an important episode for anyone hoping for a vaginal birth after a caesarean!If you want to contact Ashley for support with your VBAC or HBAC you can find her at https://ashleywinning.com or on instagram at https://www.instagram.com/ashleylwinning/
0:04
Welcome to the Better Birth podcast.
My name's Erin and I'm a hypno birthing and antenatal instructor, birth activist and all round birth geek.
In this podcast, I chat to experts in the field of pregnancy and birth, debunking myths around birth, diving into the research around maternity care, and exploring what is it that means you're more likely to have a positive birthing experience.
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If you enjoyed this podcast, do feel free to buy me a coffee and fund my caffeine habits.
Link to my Buy Me a Coffee page is in the podcast info.
Enjoy this episode.
0:52
Welcome to the better Birth podcast.
I am very, very happy to have the wonderful Ashley winning with me today to talk about V back and home birth.
And this is a podcast.
It's been a long time coming because I think we've attempted about four times to try and meet up and record this, but with various different things and illnesses and time differences.
1:14
It's been tricky, hasn't it Ashley?
Yes, it's been fun, so thanks for sticking with me through that.
Pudding me.
So Ashley, for those of you don't know, Ashley is a birth educator and doula podcaster and birth advocate and also like me, a mum of three.
1:36
Ashley, would you want to introduce yourself a little bit and just talk about what it is that you do and and why you do it?
Yeah, sure.
So I started this journey with motherhood and I had a unplanned cesarean section with my first after a failed induction.
1:54
And then I went on to advocate really hard and well for myself to have AV back in the public system in hospital.
And I found myself having spontaneous labour and winding up in another unplanned unnecessary C-section.
I had significant birth trauma and PTSD after that cesarean section that basically turned into an emergency C-section where I got a special scar and I lost 3.1 litres of blood with a postpartum hemorrhage after that.
2:23
And I ended up with a special scar.
And then I was told never to labour again.
I could never have AV back or anything.
And I was gutted.
And so I kind of went on a mission to learn as much as I could.
And through that that process, I became a postpartum doula because I knew I wasn't ready to work with women in birth.
2:41
I needed to heal and I needed to grow myself.
And I knew it wasn't the right space.
So I moved and started working with women and sharing information about breastfeeding and all of the things that are wonderful about postpartum.
And then I eventually, four years later, went on to have a free birth after two caesareans with a special scarf, big babies, high BMI, all of the things that basically they wouldn't allow you to do in a hospital system.
3:08
And it was the most magical, powerful experience of my life.
And then I kind of moved and started during that period.
I, I created my own podcast called the V back Homer series podcast.
And that's where I got to connect with amazing experts and hear wonderful women's stories.
3:26
And so I've kind of just been in that space ever since because it was, it all started with me, like the whole thing started with me, but really just to share the information that I never received through my experience.
I just didn't want anyone else to kind of have to go through that.
3:42
I just don't think that it's, I think there's a basic level of information that should be given to women.
And I know that you feel the same from what you share on your social media media.
And so I really just want to continue spreading that information so women can make informed decisions on their own and have the births that they deserve to have.
4:03
Like it's, it's a very basic thing, women having vaginal births and it's disgusting and really disappointing that they're being robbed from women.
Yeah, yeah.
That's.
Where I am.
Yeah, yeah.
And I and I think, I think it, you're right.
4:19
It's so important that people have a basic level of information and we don't get that when we're pregnant or if we do get information, it's biased or it's selective or it fits a narrative that you know the hospital want to push, particularly when it comes to V back.
4:39
I've supported lots of feedback clients and you know, you get told you you can't, you're not allowed, you have to, you know, when we talk about the risks, you know, the risks of scar rupture and the risks of this and the risk of that.
4:56
Nothing's ever quantified.
So you can't make those informed decisions.
And you were saying earlier before we started recording that you, you have supported because you're in Australia, aren't you?
And you've supported clients in the UK who are hoping to have a home birth.
5:13
So you, you have, you not only are aware of the challenges that come in, you know, in Australia, but over this side of the world as well, we have challenges trying to achieve a home birth if you've had a previous C-section.
I have worked with women in the UK recently and it blows my mind.
5:32
I literally thought that because you're allowed to have AV back home birth, I thought that it would be so much easier.
And I found some of my clients were getting threatened with solicitor letters.
Like just we're sending this solicitor letter because you're having AV back home birth, which we allow, but we're going to send a solicitor letter just to scare the bejesus out of you.
5:53
Like it is, it's out of control just how far they'll go just to fear women out of the choices that they're making.
And I find that very coercive and abusive.
It's really, really disappointing.
But I speak to and I work with women all over the world.
6:10
So the United States is the same.
I work with women there.
I've spoken with women in Turkey and in South Africa and the same situation seems to be unfolding in majority of those spaces that I've spoken to women.
6:26
And it's just doesn't matter where you're birthing.
I mean, I'm sure there's some really friendly places that maybe do support VBAC.
And we know that from the VBAC rates mainly, you know, Sweden, Switzerland, that sort of thing.
But here in Australia, the VBAC rate is actually 12%.
6:44
In the USA it's 12%.
I think where you are, it's about between 28 to 32 percent or something like that.
And we're failing miserably here in in Australia and it's really disappointing.
Yeah.
And it's, it's not, you know, it's not just, it's not just the, the physical effect of having repeat C sections.
7:08
I think that that that is important to think about.
It's also the, the, the effects on people's mental health.
You know, like you were saying how you know, you've had those 2C sections, you had a very, very traumatic experience of your second C-section.
7:23
And I imagine that third birth, that free birth, your home birth was, was really healing for you.
And I think we are robbing people of healing births if they've had a previous C-section and really do want to have a a vaginal birth.
7:41
Absolutely, I feel like I was robbed from day dot, like I'd never planned for AC section.
So to me, I felt like a complete failure, but also I couldn't believe that I'd end up in major surgery to birth a baby and then to find out that I didn't need to have that and then to find out going through it again, it is.
8:01
It's as if someone's robbed something sacred from you.
And so when I had that home birth experience, I felt whole.
And the only way I could explain it was I could get up and I didn't have this big cut all over my belly where I couldn't laugh, I couldn't cough.
8:17
And the amount of times that I've had conversations with healthcare practitioners in regards to this and they say, oh, it could have gone worse.
You should just be thankful you've got a healthy baby.
And I'm like, I would have had a healthy baby anyway.
What are, what are we talking about here?
I would have had a healthy baby.
8:33
The baby wasn't unhealthy.
I wasn't unhealthy.
Don't dismiss my emotional and spiritual experience.
But they didn't have the training and the trauma and the awareness that the trauma informed care.
And then I started to realize as I've gone even even further into it, that sometimes doctors can be a little bit like talking to a computer.
8:56
I kind of feel like sometimes that they spit out all the statistics and the numbers and, and sometimes they're missing that human connection.
And and so that's a real trouble when you put surgeons or people within that capacity in charge of women's emotional and mental welfare, because how we respond after we have our child, we're the ones primary looking after the baby.
9:22
It has a huge knock on effects to the whole family as a whole.
You know, the way that I mothered my babies, my two younger ones, was significantly different to how I did with my third one.
And I look back and I think, oh, all I can think and all I can see is me wanting to pack my bags.
9:42
I've made a mistake.
This is horrific.
And feeling trapped and feeling scared and alone.
And when I did reach out to people, you've got GP saying just be grateful that you've got a healthy baby.
And so it's just like stacking on top because they're not trained.
9:57
And so it just keeps happening to women and you know, at some point what what are the what are the long term impacts for those children being raised with, you know, those sorts of situations happening.
Yeah, it's, it's the, the impact is far reaching, isn't it?
10:16
It's not just about having an extra scar.
It's it like you say it, it, it the impact effects generations potentially what, what are some of the common reasons that you hear that people are told that they can't have a home birth if they want AV back?
10:36
Because I suspect or I don't expect, I know that quite often if someone's saying they've, they've had a previous C-section, they want a home birth, they will use that as kind of a negotiation tool.
So OK, well, if you don't want another C-section, we don't want having home birth.
10:53
So how about we let you birth in the birth centre instead?
Then, you know, don't have a home birth, but we'll will, will, will will allow you to birth on the birth centre as a compromise.
How about that?
And then the person has kind of kind of been, you know, coerced into a, a, a medical setting thinking that they've got a good deal there, but actually they've kind of been hoodwinked.
11:20
Yeah, because we don't have those options here in Australia.
They won't let you birth in a birth center after AV.
If you're having AV bank, they will not allow you to have a publicly funded home birth, but you can hire a privately funded midwife.
11:37
So I would say, I mean, I would love to, it's, it's funny, I would love to be coerced into a birth centre because what we're actually given and that and you know, being coerced in a birth centre is not great because if a woman wants to have a home birth, she wants to have a home birth.
11:54
And I do not appreciate women being pushed.
And I and A lot of the women I work with are people pleasers.
I'm a people pleaser myself.
And so you don't want to cause a fuss.
You don't want to be the mean girl or the, or the bitch.
You just want to not rock the boat.
12:10
But you really want the things that you want as well.
But it feels, oh, well, you know, maybe I'm asking for too much.
So you say yes to that and then you say yes to this.
And before you know it, you, your home birth experience is completely down the drain and you're basically having a highly medicalized hospital birth.
12:27
And there's a reason why you can't birth in the birth centre.
And before you know it, you're in the hospital.
But essentially the reasons for naivey back here is the woman's too small, her pelvis is too small, she's too short, she's too fat, her baby's too big.
What's another one?
12:45
She must go into spontaneous labour by 39 weeks because of that, that induction 39 week study that went out, basically all the usual kind of stuff.
It's just a long list of reasons.
Every now and then you'll see a scarf thickness thing jump in the way.
13:03
And even though that's not evidence based and it's pretty much just the usual cascade of, you know, the reasons why a woman can't give birth vaginally essentially, and why we should just put you in for AC section because that's where you're going to end up anyways.
13:19
Yeah, it's crazy, isn't it?
It?
I mean, I I hear all of these reasons because these are all reasons that are thrown at people for induction, right?
You're too big, the baby's too big.
Baby's too small.
You're too old, you're too fat, you've gone too long, you're not quite, you know, I mean, there's like a whole long list of reasons and those reasons are getting thrown at people who want to have a, a vaginal birth after AC section with the added complication of having a previous C-section.
13:52
But no one's thinking or talking about the benefits of having a spontaneous birth after a previous C-section.
Because there's benefits, right?
There's risk, there's benefits, benefits to the to the person giving birth and benefits to the baby, right?
Yeah, that's that's the main problem.
14:10
It's that you're feeding people, you know, one, one part of the information.
You're not actually saying these are the risks.
These are the risks on this side.
These are the pros on this side.
Now choose your own adventure.
It's up to you that essentially that is what should be happening.
This is what you can have.
14:26
This is a smorgasbord.
You choose because you live with the consequences of those choices, right?
You ask me questions, I'll provide you the evidence.
You and your partner go away.
You decide choose your own adventure and come back and tell me because I don't care regardless because it's not my body and not my baby.
14:44
Like imagine if people were going to work and doing that and that's how they treated people.
And they said, but it is very complicated because of the, the leak, the system and, and their insurance and what their, I heard was it Nathan, the obstetrician on Instagram, he shared that an obstetrician in America reached out and they supported A breach baby and they're coming after that obstetrician now.
15:13
And so he's done what the person wanted and it was a successful thing.
I think.
I don't think there was any problems.
And they've come after him for his job.
And so if the system is coming after the people working, they're not safe.
15:29
And so nobody feels safe.
And that's one of the biggest problems.
And you can't trust people who don't feel safe.
You've got midwives who want to do good things in there, but they get bullied and they get attacked and they get treated like this.
And it's like, how many red marks can you have and how much can you slip, fly under the radar and that sort of thing.
15:49
I know if I'd be working in the system, I'd be like this naughty, not doing anything.
But then you just be getting reprimanded and trouble and called in.
And so that really takes a toll.
And that's why, for me, home birth is one of the safest spaces to be.
16:05
Yeah.
And and evidence shows that right.
We know, we know, and we look at research that home birth has a huge host of benefits.
You're much less likely to experience medical intervention and a medical cascade if you have a home birth because there's not a ton of people putting and poking and intervening and messing about with your labour.
16:27
When, when we think about home birth, I think one of, so we've talked about some of the reasons you might get told not to have a home birth if you, if you had a previous C-section.
I think one of the really common things that people get told is what if your skull ruptures?
16:43
Well, if your skull ruptures and you're at home and you're not in hospital, you're going to die.
Like why would you want to risk it?
What is the actual risk of scar rupture?
I know we've I've covered this in previous episodes with with Hazel, but it's really small, right?
16:58
The actual chances of your scar rupturing are actually really, really small.
Yes, I'm going to quote write Hazel's research because it's amazing.
And it's like the latest thing we've kind of got.
So it's 22 per 10,000 births or 0.22% for A1 like AAV back after one just normal sort of scar.
17:21
And so when you hear it all the time, women saying, oh, if I rupture, I'm going to die.
This is going to happen.
Actually, the risk of death from women from Utah and rupture is 0.002%, which is such a small amount of women that so when they come in and they say that to you, that's not true, it's not factual.
17:41
And I don't know how legally they can get away with saying things like that because it's essentially a lie.
Like there's evidence out there stating the complete opposite.
And I don't understand how people can continue with their jobs in these positions of authority, blatantly lying to people and causing people to make choices that potentially are not the safest or best for them as well.
18:06
So it's really interesting.
Those statistics should be handed out to women and we should actually be saying these are the statistics.
Well, here's the statistics for the second.
Maybe it's a little bit higher.
Nobody agrees.
Of course they're going to say, oh, we don't agree with these ones, but let's just agree on something.
18:24
And it's up to the woman to decide what she what risks she wants to take.
Because as you mentioned, there's risks on the other side as well.
And every C-section that you have, the risks do go up.
And by the time you get to three or four, that's when they start getting really antsy with you and saying, hey, hold up, it's getting risky now.
18:43
But at any point did you ask me how many children I want to have?
Like what's my plan as a woman who's planning 4 babies?
I got asked that I think with my second baby maybe at about 39 weeks after I got kicked out of hospital at 37 weeks here in Australia.
19:00
And so that was the first time anyone asked me like, hey, Ashley, why do you want to have AV back?
That makes reasonable sense.
I think that's great.
You want to have this many.
It was like, I was like, whoa, what is happening here?
But it took me maybe 10 plus OBGY NS to kind of find one to say that to me.
19:20
And she was pregnant.
So I really do think that that kind of that maternal instinct took over and she was thinking about herself in that situation too.
Yeah, it's, it's it, it blows my mind when you actually look at the statistics.
19:36
Like he said, nought .22% will have a scar rupture and of that nought .22% and even smaller.
It's like tiny percentage will actually die from that skull rupture and yet we're telling people don't have a home birth because your scar might rupture or don't have a don't don't don't have a vaginal birth because your scar might rupture.
20:00
We we should be giving you another C-section.
Bonkers.
When it comes to rupturing as well, I do believe like having a spontaneous physiological birth is going to be the best way to identify if there's something wrong as well.
20:16
And so for me planning that home birth, I was really interested in the signs of rupture so that I could get myself to hospital as quickly as possible.
I'm only 7 minutes away from the hospital, so I was looking at the signs like the signs are there might be some pain in your shoulders, your intuition might be telling you there's something wrong, pain when the the contractions aren't happening, potential bleeding.
20:41
If you're right at the end where baby's coming, baby might be getting sucked right up, might be a really prolonged pushing stage right at the end like that.
Fer not, we're not talking about posterior pushing.
That could last for a very long time.
But I did go on a mission to kind of ask women and I'm part of because I did have that special scar.
21:00
I am part of rupture and special scar groups.
So I asked women who had ruptured, what happened to them and what was their story.
And so there was a couple who lost their babies and basically there were women who were planning C sections.
21:16
They ruptured before labour.
There was a mixture who ruptured during labour.
Some of them were not, it wasn't even identified while they were in the care of the hospital.
Nobody could kind of pick it up.
And so some women found out the next day when they were starting to feel poorly and starting to pass out that they had internal bleeding and that sort of thing.
21:39
It's really interesting.
And so I thought, well, I'm going to be in the safest hands listening to my intuition, not being told because what was happening is they were telling doctors or they were telling their healthcare team and they were kind of, they couldn't see anything on the machine.
So they're looking at the machines.
21:56
Whereas I believe in looking at the woman and trusting and listening to the woman.
So that was my deep belief.
I had that.
I believe in instinctive physiological birth.
I really, I interviewed Rachel Reed on my podcast and I just love everything that she has to say.
22:12
And I thought, well, we were talking about lazy podcasting before.
That's my lazy birthing, like intuitive birthing, just follow your body's lead.
I don't need to learn anything.
Just it'll happen the way it needs to happen, right?
I'll move into positions and it worked.
22:28
I birthed a 10 LB baby out of my vagina with no tearing at home without any medical help or support.
I would have liked to have had a midwife but unfortunately I couldn't find one who could support me.
But just goes to show you how amazing our bodies can be.
22:45
And you know, if you need that medical support, you know, hopefully you can get it if you need it, but otherwise, you can get yourself to the hospital if you're close.
I think, I think that's amazing and, and you're so right.
I think we, I think again, it's, it's the medical industry has influenced our views and our opinions and our beliefs around birth.
23:07
So that we are fixated on how many centimetres dilated are we are or how many contractions we're having in the space of 10 minutes.
What point we are in labour.
And actually, when I get clients who ask me like if it's particularly for having a home birth, you know, you know, how do I know when I'm at this point or how do I, does it matter?
23:27
Like does it matter?
Your body's doing what it needs to do.
Your baby's going to come out eventually.
As long as your baby's fine and you're fine, it doesn't matter.
Just listen to your body.
You move how you feel, you want to move, you know, get into positions that feel comfortable.
Don't worry about what point you've hit because it's a, it's, it will mess with your head, right?
23:49
We're trying to intellectualise something that is very intuitive and damaging to do that because it, it only does it mess with your, your ability to, to cope with labour, but it, it messes with the whole, the actual Physiology of labour as well, because you're trying to intellectualise something that's that's, that's it's intuitive.
24:14
Exactly and I'm all for it.
Like whenever I see someone, I don't know if you shared this on your on your socials or anything like you know about dates.
We're talking about dates.
Eat a certain date.
It's like that's not what you need to worry about.
You actually just need to know and believe in instinctive and physiological birth and like protect that space and believe in yourself.
24:35
I definitely went through the the with my first and second.
It was all about contraction timers and all of those things.
And when I had my third baby, I had this, I had posterior birth.
I had a posterior with my second and they were so wide eyed and oh, you know, babies ROT and synlytic up high, blah blah blah, you're pushing blah blah blah, cervical lip, all these things, right?
24:58
And so I went on a mission afterwards to research all those things, which is all a variation of normal, nothing to be concerned about.
But in the hospital system, it is something to be concerned about because they see that as a problem and then they just decide instantly, oh, we need to get that woman into C-section because she's not going to birth vaginally.
25:18
But at home, you have that time and ability to work through whatever's coming your way.
But what I found was that that normal transition, right, that we talked about of early labor, the next you're in real labor now and then you're in this and this transition, right?
25:36
I went into transition in the as soon as I went into labor.
So my waters broke within half an hour, contraction started and I went straight into transition.
And by the time I mean I was still in labour for another 1314 hours.
By the time the baby came through, I was like having an awesome time through labour.
25:54
There was like pleasurable parts.
My husband and I were intimate and and sometimes the oxytocin was going and the only thing that was annoying was my numb leg.
But if I had listened to this whole, there's a transition period and you don't get a freak out at this point, and I would have freaked out at the start and thought, oh God, if I can't handle this, how am I going to handle when I get to real transition?
26:18
But I never got to that part.
By the time I was ready to have my baby, it was, you know, that I'd already been through the hardest part the first couple of hours.
And nobody talks about that, that those parts of Labor and those experiences can be mixed up all throughout.
And every woman's experience is different.
26:35
You can have that in the middle.
You could have your mini freak out in the middle.
You can have your mini freak out at the end.
You can have, maybe you won't have a freak out.
Maybe you'll just have this pleasurable, amazing experience.
And so every birth and every woman's experience is unique.
26:52
Yeah.
And, and the problem is when we don't listen to people when they're in labour because they don't fit the, the kind of standardized view of the set stages of labour and the set dilation and, and you know, the set contraction patterns, then we end up causing problems because I feel need.
27:14
I feel like I need to push.
No, you don't.
You're only three centimetres half an hour ago.
And then there's a baby's head or I don't feel, I don't, I feel like something's wrong.
No, you're fine.
You're just hitting transition.
Oh, no, actually baby's in distress now because we didn't listen.
27:31
So listening to intuition's really, really important.
And I think care providers, midwives, obstetricians should be listening to the person rather than relying on the CCG or whatever, monitoring or whatever kind of rules and guidelines and policies we have because I think it's really damaging.
27:52
Yeah, and imagine if they spent their time teaching women how to tap into their intuition and and what to listen to and building that relationship so that when they see them in birth, they've got that relationship.
The woman's already feeling confident and not.
28:09
It's the complete opposite.
It's like disconnection to disconnect from your body.
Don't listen.
Don't trust where the authority.
Listen to us.
Go in with some rando and we're gonna tell you everything.
That kind of has to happen.
And no wonder it's like a big hot mess in there.
28:24
And with the whole posterior birthright, I was pushing for 10 hours.
So not every single contraction, but every three or four contractions, my body was pushing.
So the typical is you go 10 centimeters and then your baby will be born shortly, right?
28:40
So that's what happened with my second.
I was pretty much fully dilated.
And I'm like, but when you get to 10 centimeters, the baby just comes out, right?
Like what are you talking?
Why are we talking C-section?
The baby comes out, my body started pushing.
And you hear these women who were pushing for long periods of time, maybe they're being coached and they're 10 centimetres, but maybe their babies are really high.
29:03
And so for an example, I love sharing this with people because posterior birth is something people don't talk about enough.
I was pushing for 10 hours in my home birth undisturbed, no one telling me what to do or that it was wrong or it was right.
And I know that's completely normal.
29:18
Now.
I speak to women every day who share those.
And I say, you're posterior, weren't you?
And they'll.
And they're like, oh, yeah, actually, I was, how'd you know?
And I said, well, because what you're telling me and but no one has told them that before.
Nobody in the system knows that.
And so they're treating posterior women like there's something, well, they're not posterior women, but they're presenting posterior like there's something wrong with their bodies and we have to fix this.
29:42
But it's just they don't know what's happening with the birthing woman and the baby.
And then allowing that space for it to the magic to unfold essentially, which is very dangerous.
Yeah, I think we just we, we, I say we not they pathology, they pathology thing.
30:01
And I think that that that becomes almost like a snowball effect because then we need to pathologise even more because we've just caused harm by not, you know, not letting, not failure, failure to wait.
You know, we talk about failure to progress, failure to wait, failing to just wait and watch and listen and allow things to to unfold.
30:27
I feel like we've gone on like a tangent away from V back and home birth and we're talking more about about birth in general.
But I think it's, I still think it's really valuable and really, really important because I think particularly if somebody is planning AV back, I think there's potential there for them for somebody to be more anxious.
30:47
I think because it's hard not to be right.
If somebody's been chipping away at a resolve and planting all these little seeds of doubt in your brain, I think it is very easy to kind of get caught up on that and, and, and worry about things that actually are really, really normal.
31:03
And you think it's good to think, you know, be talking about, you know, what is normal and, you know, listening to your intuition, which we don't do or we suppress a lot as women, I think.
Yeah, we're not, We're not.
31:19
We don't go to school.
They don't teach you to trust your intuition.
When you're little, you're kind of told these are the experts to go to the GP, the doctor.
What's wrong with me, doctor?
And then you go to work and then they say this is what you're doing and I'm the boss and you listen to me.
31:35
These are the rules.
So we're never really given.
I think things are probably a little bit different now for people, you know, coming through.
But for certainly for when I was growing up, it was always look at other people to tell you what to do when you fall in line.
You kind of do that sort of thing.
So I can understand why it's so hard and so challenging.
31:54
And I'm glad that I'm breaking free through that.
And that my birth was, and I see it with a lot of women who I work with that by them saying yes to themselves.
It's, it's like, it's not just about the birth.
It's like then they can say yes to what they want to do with their children and how they want to live their lives.
32:14
And it's a huge knock on effect to their entire life journey because they they've had this huge transformation.
And so it can be very challenging through the the pregnancy to kind of work on the boundaries, have those conversations, choose the right things for you.
32:30
But if women can do that and families can do that, there are such massive benefits.
Like we homeschool now and I always wanted to home school.
Like I used to say it to my mother-in-law and she was an ex teacher and she used to laugh at me and I, I like the idea of home schooling and she'd just laugh at me.
32:48
And then after my home birth experience, I was in with the home birthers.
So a lot of home birthers home school and started to get a little bit more real.
And it's amazing how your life opens up and you set yourself on a different path through just following your own alignment.
33:06
Yeah, I think yeah, Birth a baby is not just born when somebody gives birth, I think a, a mother is born and it sets you on a completely different journey and and your birth, how you experience birth really effects how you parent and how you feel as a parent, I think.
33:25
And similarly to you, you know, I had quite a Med, I didn't have AC section with my first, but I definitely had a very medicalised birth.
And like, same as you, I, I look at how I parented my eldest compared to how I parent the younger two.
And it's very, very different, particularly the 1st 12 months, very, very, very different.
33:44
And it does make you wonder, you know, when you look at your child and their behaviours and their personality, how much did I influence that with their birth and, you know, the 1st 12 months of their life.
But we're only, we're operating on the information that we have right at the time.
34:02
And so that's, that's, that's, you know, there's, there's not much you can do about it in hindsight, but it is why you're so passionate.
And I'm so passionate about educating people so that they are making really good decisions to start off with and not experiencing that trauma, you know, from the off and they're avoiding those kind of traumatic experiences.
34:24
So I really, you know, I really appreciate you coming on today and, and chatting to, to, to, to me and sharing, you know, this information because I think it's really, really important.
Thank you so much for having me.
It's been awesome in a chat all the way from Australia and I really appreciate being able to chat with you today.
34:43
So if you mentioned that you have supported people in the UK, and the majority of my audience is in the UK, although I do have people, you know, other countries as well that listen to the podcast.
If somebody does want to have AV back, or they're planning a home berth after AC section and they want support, where can they find you?
35:01
Yeah, probably my Instagram or website.
So Ashley L winning and I'm sure you'll put the links in and then my website is just ashleywinning.com and you can find I've got quite a lot of offerings and I also have AV back membership too that I've just launched.
35:18
So there's a lot of V back and homebirth H back friendly stuff there to support people.
So come and say hello.
I would love to hear from you.
Lovely.
Thank you so much for your time today.
Thank you.
The Better Birth Podcast and all of its content is for educational and informational purposes only.
35:45
You should consult your midwife or your doctor for anything in relation to your own pregnancy and birth.
The opinions and the views of the guests on the Better Birth Podcast are their own opinions and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Better Birth or Erin Fung.
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