On today’s podcast, we’re going to talk with Nikki Hunter-Greenaway, Nurse Practitioner and IBCLC, about the formula shortage this year and meeting your community at where they are to provide the concierge reproductive health care they deserve.

Nikki Hunter-Greenaway, AKA, Nurse Nikki is a board-certified family nurse practitioner and International Board Certified Lactation Consultant. Nikki is the proud owner of Bloom Maternal Health, which provides Telehealth and house calls to pregnant and postpartum families in both Texas and Louisiana. 

In 2018, she co-founded the New Orleans Breastfeeding Center and Café au Lait Breastfeeding Circle for families of color, and co-founded Nikki and Nikki Lactation Career Consultants to help Black, Indigenous, and People of Color demystify the path to becoming an IBCLC. Her goal is to improve maternal health outcomes through community education, peer mentorship, and patient-centered care.

We will talk about challenges and insights Nurse Nikki experienced during her journey to becoming a lactation consultant. We also talk about cultural barriers in lactation, the importance of meeting folks where they are, and the effects of the formula shortage on the communities she serves.

Content warning: We will discuss the cultural barriers and in the field of lactation, gendered language (breastfeeding), plus mentions of historical trauma, horizontal violence, formula shortage, maternal mortality rates, infant mortality rates, abortion, postpartum depression, classism, Black maternal disparities, and racism.

 
Resources:

• Nikki's FNP and IBCLC practice: Nurse Niki NP
• Cafe au Lait in New Orleans
• Follow Nikki on Instagram @nursenikkinp and on YouTube at "Nurse Nikki NP" 
• EBB 189 – Why Black Lactation Matters and the Importance of Black Breastfeeding Week with IBCLC, Janiya Mitnaul Williams 
• WHO International Code of Marketing of Breast - Milk Substitutes 
• Go to our YouTube channel to see video versions of YouTube episodes you listed above!!

For more information and news about Evidence Based Birth®, visit www.ebbirth.com.

Find us on:

• Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/ebbirth/ ),
• TikTok (https://www.tiktok.com/@ebbirth), and
• Pinterest (https://www.pinterest.com/ebbirth/ ).

Ready to get involved?

• Check out our Professional membership (including scholarship options) (https://evidencebasedbirth.com/become-pro-member/ ).
• Apply to be an EBB Instructor here (https://www.evidencebasedbirth.com/instructor )
• Click here (https://evidencebasedbirth.com/childbirth-class/ ) to learn more about the Evidence Based Birth® Childbirth Class

In today’s podcast, we’re going to be talking with EBB Childbirth Class Parent, Katie Kane about the birth of her second baby. Unexpectedly, her second baby was in a breech position, leading to a surgical birth after the unmedicated vaginal birth of her first baby.
 
Katie Kane is a high school counselor who lives in New Jersey with her two daughters, husband, and dog Roscoe.
 
Katie is the first EBB Childbirth Class graduate to tell both of her birth stories on the Evidence Based Birth® Podcast!
 
Katie talks about her journey with a breech baby, including all of the tools and techniques she used for support throughout her pregnancy. Ultimately, the baby persisted in the breech position, and she was able to experience a family-centered cesarean by speaking with her birth team.
 
Katie’s story is perfect for anyone planning a cesarean or writing a cesarean birth plan. She talks about healing physically, and emotionally, and speaks of advocating for her family’s wishes amid an unplanned surgical birth.  
 
Content warning: breech birth, unexpected cesarean birth, fear of death, postpartum anxiety, perinatal anxiety, postpartum rage, thoughts/fears of maternal death and includes some gendered language.

Resources:

• Listen to Katie's first Interview with Rebecca here: EBB 127 – An unmedicated hospital birth with Katie Kane
• Chiropractic Prenatal Care & the Webster Technique: https://icpa4kids.com/training/webster-certification/webster-technique/
• Spinning Babies (for fetal positioning/breech babies): https://www.spinningbabies.com
• EBB 111 – Positioning Breech Babies with Dr. Elliot Berlin
• EBB 171 – The Experience of a Unique Vaginal Breech Birth with Janae and Andrew Rick
• EBB 172 – Breech Vaginal Birth with Dr. Rixa Freeze and Dr. David Hayes
• EBB 173 - Evidence on External Cephalic Version for Breeched Positioned Babies
• Take the EBB Childbirth Class and find an Instructor near you! https://evidencebasedbirth.com/childbirth-class/ 

In this week's podcast I interview Cheri Grant RN, ICCE, CLC, ICD, CLD, CD BDT(DONA), known in the birth world as "the peanut ball lady.” She is the founder, chief contributor and inspiration for Premier Birth Tools. For over 45 years, she has served women as a labor and delivery nurse, childbirth educator, lactation consultant, national speaker, author, doula, and doula trainer. She has helped with well over 2,700 deliveries in the span of her career. Cheri is also the founder of Tulsa Doulas, a community group that has helped train and support doulas for over 20 years.

Cheri’s interest in peanut balls began when she first saw their use in labor in 1985. At that time, they were just straddled. In the 2000’s, the usage of peanut balls was refined to the side-lying position, and interest in them began to grow among birth professionals. They are used with and without an epidural, and can be effective in shortening labor. Premier Birth Tools promotes education via its website, as well as Peanut Ball Ambassadors and Authorized Peanut Ball Trainers. Cheri discusses peanut ball positions and other new information on this tool.

Content Warning: Episode contains gendered language. 

Resources:

Connect with Cheri at the Premier Birth Tools website and Facebook page.

Purchase her book The Peanut Ball: Basic and Advanced Techniques.

Contact Premier Birth Tools for a free information packet for doulas, L&D nurses, midwives and nursing instructors.

Learn more about the Evidence on: Birthing Positions Signature Article here

For more information and news about Evidence Based Birth®, visit www.ebbirth.com. Find us on Instagram, and Pinterest.

Ready to get involved? Check out our Professional membership (including scholarship options), our Instructor Program and, for parents, check out our Childbirth Education Classes 

On today’s podcast, we’re going to talk with the founder of Every Baby Eats, licensed clinical social worker, and IBCLC, Kristin Cavuto

Kristin Cavuto, pronouns she/they, is a licensed clinical social worker in IBCLC and private practice in central New Jersey. Her practice specialties are low supply, parental and infant mental health, and the intersection of ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender in the care of the new family.
 
Kristin is the mother of two children who nursed full-time despite maternal insufficient glandular tissue (IGT) and who are now 16 and 13. Kristin is also an anti-racist activist and an LGBT+ activist, a member of Transformative Works fandoms, and makes fighting for a better world part of their daily life.

We talk to Kristin about supporting families struggling with feeding infants in a realistic, family-centered, and non-disparaging way. We also talk about fatphobia as a form of oppression and marginalization in medicine and birth and what we can all do to challenge bias and model acceptance

Content warning: We mention the intersection of fatphobia and racism.

Resources:

• EBB 99 – Plus Size Pregnancy and Birth with Jen McLellan 
• Harvard Implicit Bias Test
• Fat Phobia Scale Revisited by Robinson, Bacon, et al. 
• HAES (Health at Every Size)
• The Body is Not An Apology 
• National Association for the Advancement of Fat People 
• To follow Kristin on Facebook 
• Kristin's current project: https://www.everybabyeats.com/

Today, we are going to explore brand new updates to the Evidence Based Birth® Signature Article, Evidence on: Eating during Labor! We talk about four major topics: 

1. Nutritional needs during labor
2. New info on gestational or pre-gestational diabetes and eating during labor
3. New research on anesthesiology and its relationship to eating and drinking during labor, and
4. Finally, how body mass index and fatphobia relate to anesthesia concerns, and what that has to do with eating during labor.
    
    Content Warning: pregnancy-related death, anesthesia-related death, fatphobia and anesthesia, microaggressions related to health care workers' reaction to ethnic foods
    
   Resources:

• Refer to previous podcast episode: EBB 198 - Evidence on Eating & Drinking (linked on blog post below)
• Check out our Signature Article… Evidence on: Eating and Drinking during Labor at
• Check out our Signature Article... Evidence on: IV Fluids on Labor
• Check out our Signature Article... Evidence on: Diagnosing Gestational Diabetes
• Fat Phobia and It’s Racist Past and Present: https://www.npr.org/transcripts/893006538
• For a full list of scientific references, see the blog post that goes along with this episode

Today, I am so excited to present to you a replay of one of our most popular episodes on the Evidence Based Birth® podcast, and that is an episode from 2020 with special guest, Shafia Monroe. Before we get started with the replay, I wanted to let you know that this episode contains discussion of Black infant and maternal mortality related to racism, slavery and Jim Crow, and racism that continues to affect people’s lives today.
 
Shafia gave us such an inspirational episode in 2020, that we wanted to bring it back for those of you who are new to EBB, or for those of you who’ve listened to it before. Whenever I listen to this episode, it fills me with a sense of awe for Black traditional midwives, and it gives me hope while it reminds me of the tenacity of the human spirit.

So join us today as we replay this episode and you go on a storytelling journey with Mama Shafia Monroe about spirituality and traditional midwives.

In today’s podcast episode, we’re going to talk with Shafia Monroe about the role of the traditional midwife.

Shafia Monroe is a public health professional, a midwife, a motivational speaker, founder of the International Center for Traditional Childbearing, or ICTC, which was the first US-based black midwives and doulas professional organization. Shafia is also an author, infant mortality prevention specialist, doula trainer, and president of Doula Ready, LLC. Since 2002, she has trained thousands of people in doula trainings, with one-third of them going on to become midwives. In 2012, Shafia received her Master of Public Health from Walden University. In 2014, she opened Shafia Monroe Consulting, a cultural competency training service. Shafia has received numerous awards for her work, including the Lifetime Achievement Award and the Midwife Hero Award.

In this podcast, Ms. Monroe discusses the history of Black traditional midwifery and incorporating spirituality into birth work. We also talk about Shafia’s experience becoming a traditional Black midwife, along with her passion for advocacy in birth work through her doula program and her community.

**Trigger Content Warning: This podcast episode discusses racism and infant loss.**

Resources

• Learn more about Shafia Monroe and SMC Full Circle Doula Birth Companion Training here (https://shafiamonroe.com/).
• Follow Shafia on Instagram and Black Midwife Cooking here (https://www.instagram.com/shafiamonroe/).  
• Follow Shafia on Twitter here (https://twitter.com/Shafia_SMC).
• Follow Shafia on Facebook here (https://www.facebook.com/shafiamonroeconsulting/). 
• Click here (https://evidencebasedbirth.com/birth-justice/) to see the Evidence Based Birth® list of Birth Justice Resources, including research on racism and maternal health.
• More resources are listed on the the blog post at https://www.evidencebasedbirth.com/152  

On today's podcast, we're going to talk with Melek Öz about vaginal birth after Cesarean (VBAC), advocacy, and becoming a home birth midwife!

Content note: Mention of weight loss and racism.

Melek Öz (she/her) is a home birth midwife living with her family in South Austin, Texas. She moved to Austin in 2001 to attend the University of Texas, where she completed both her undergraduate studies and law school before transitioning to birth work. Melek has been active in birth advocacy for more than a decade throughout her childbearing years and now as a home birth midwife.

With her first pregnancy, Melek was told by her OB that her pelvis was "too small." She was pressured into an early induction that turned into a preventable Cesarean. Fresh out of surgery, Melek's OB told her, "Now that you've had one Cesarean, all your babies will have to be born by Cesarean."

In this podcast episode, Melek goes on to share her subsequent birth stories, in which she had a CBAC (Cesarean Birth after Cesarean) under general anesthesia, as well as a vaginal birth after 2 C-sections (VBA2C). Midwifery care helped her have "a really joyous and an incredible experience, and I'm lucky that I had all 3 experiences that I did, because it helped kind of round out and balance my views on birth."

Melek went on to pursue a career as a doula and eventually a home birth midwife! In this episode, we talk about the power of midwifery care, unpacking racism/classism and how it affects midwifery students, and how we can advocate for VBAC access in our communities. She also gives great tips for people who are considering a VBAC or thinking about going into midwifery!

Resources:

• Follow Melek Öz on Instagram (@midwifemelek) and visit her website at http://www.midwifemelek.com/
• EBB Podcast #113: The Evidence on VBAC
• EBB Podcast #209: Providing Unbiased VBAC Access and Support with Jen Kamel of VBAC Facts
• Visit the VBAC Facts website: https://vbacfacts.com
• Visit the International Cesarean Awareness Network website https://www.ican-online.org/
• EBB Podcast #224: Failure to Progress (info on racist beliefs about pelvic shapes)
• Tema Mercado teaches workshops on decolonizing apprenticeships at La Matriz Birth (https://www.lamatrizbirth.com/) and @matrizmidwife on Instagram
• Luz de Atabey (https://www.instagram.com/lampatx/) project in Austin focused on accessible perinatal care and support (QTBIPOC-led)
• Kmom passed away in 2019, but her blog, "The Well Rounded Mama," is still maintained by her loving family at https://wellroundedmama.blogspot.com/, where you can find many articles about fat phobia and VBAC.
• EBB Professional Membership (includes scholarship options!) https://evidencebasedbirth.com/membership '
• Non-profit fundraising organization Black Home Birth Matters: https://www.blackhomebirthmattersatx.org/

On today's podcast, we're going to talk with EBB Childbirth Class Parents, Lisa Mangini and Anand Swaminathan about their high-intervention birth story! So many people have negative associations with interventions— but Lisa and Anand's story shows how you can still experience a joyful, empowering birth, even in the midst of complications!

Lisa Mangini is a writer living in Central Pennsylvania with her husband, Anand and young son. She teaches English and creative writing at a university and is in the early stages of writing a book about becoming a parent.

I think Lisa is the first person I've heard of who found the EBB Childbirth Class through a neurologist! During her first pregnancy (which ended in a miscarriage), Lisa had her first tonic-clonic seizure. Lisa had to dive into a journey to manage her seizure disorder and several other health conditions, all while trying to conceive and then eventually getting pregnant.

Lisa and Anand's story is perfect for anyone who is facing a high-risk pregnancy or supporting clients who are high-risk! Lisa talks about dealing with prenatal anxiety, switching hospitals and providers, deciding to hire a doula, and how a calm, experienced midwife can be a huge asset during a high-risk birth situation.

Content warning: We mention miscarriage, prenatal anxiety, high levels of medical intervention, seizures, and fear of dying during childbirth

Resources:

• Follow Lisa at @lisaquarius and Lisamangini.com
• Find an EBB Childbirth Class at https://evidencebasedbirth.com/childbirthclass
• EBB Signature Article on doulas at https://evidencebasedbirth.com/doulas
• EBB Podcast episode 175 on the evidence on midwives https://evidencebasedbirth.com/evidence-on-midwives/
• EBB Podcast episode 186 on a high-risk pregnancy with Angela Jones https://evidencebasedbirth.com/a-positive-pregnancy-and-birth-outcome-with-multiple-high-risk-labels-with-ebb-childbirth-class-parent-angela-jones/

On today's podcast, we're going to talk with EBB Childbirth Class Parent, Shelitha Owens about her inspirational home waterbirth story.

Shelitha Owens (she/her) is an environmental policy manager who lives in Oaklawn Illinois, a suburb of Chicago with her husband Bobby, their dog, Reeses and their new baby, Alexander, who was born on June 18, 2021. Having a biology background, Shelitha has always been fascinated with anatomy and was curious about pregnancy and birth. After having her son at home with a planned water birth, Shelitha’s interest in birth work skyrocketed as she enjoys talking to new and expecting parents about their birth stories.

We talk about how her experience in the EBB Childbirth Class supported her positive mindset related to the stages of labor and birth. She felt confident with the knowledge helping her and her partner prepare for their home waterbirth.

Content note: We mention grief, implicit bias/racism, and medical trauma, and there is gendered language related to finding out baby's sex.

Resources:

• Signature Article on Waterbirth: https://evidencebasedbirth.com/waterbirth/
• Research on Racial Disparities and Systemic Racism in Childbirth YouTube Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUmqcRCXysM
• EBB Childbirth Class: https://evidencebasedbirth.com/childbirth-class/