322 Revealing my entire BIRTH STORY! #VisionaryMama

The best day of our lives.

my entire BIRTH STORY

Freddie’s birth was perfect in my eyes. It was the best day of our lives.

But the truth is, it did NOT go as planned

My home birth turned into a 9-1-1 emergency phone call at 11:15PM on Christmas Eve

I ‘transitioned’ in the ambulance and had to hold off from pushing, as the paramedic drove top speed to the hospital

My worry in sharing the 90 minute audio file is simply out of fear of judgement of our birth decisions,

My intention in sharing it is to show others that even if things don’t go ‘according to plan’ it’s probably the Universe conspiring in your favour. And that your intuition is probably right… always. So don’t let anyone tell you otherwise!

I’ve had many people ask if I was upset that my ‘plan’ got derailed— and I shared my honest thoughts on this in the podcast episode.

Episode Time Stamps:

[05:35] I was SHOCKED when I went into labour on Christmas Eve and has a Christmas Day Baby! (The least common birthday!)

[11:19] Sharing openly about our conception journey, pregnancy loss, and feelings about entering parenthood.

[22:38] How I revealed our first and second pregnancy to my husband (& the really confusing pregnancy test!)

[48:37] Labour story: my manifestations, navigating pain, and how I found the inner strength

[50:54] What it feels like to be pregnant over your 'due date' and how frustrating it is when everyone asks you 'have you had the baby yet?'

[01:02:28] The ONLY regret that I have about my labour experience

[01:08:47] How I coped with pain in labour, naturally

[01:16:47] We had to call 9-1-1 and our home birth transferred to the hospital

[01:24:15] Calling in the help from the OB-GYN when Freddie's heart rate was dropping

[01:31:57] The magic of spending Christmas as a new family of 3

To connect with Kelsey:

• Kelsey’s Instagram
  

Access the transcript for this episode:

• Transcript of this episode >>

  You're listening to the Visionary Life podcast. I'm your host, Kelsey Reidl.
  
  Each week, I'll bring you conversations with the most visionary humans on this earth in hopes that you'll be able to absorb their wisdom, avoid their failures, and feel less alone on the roller coaster ride that is entrepreneurship. This season, I'll be chatting with creative thinkers, masterful marketers, brick and mortar shop owners, brand builders, and people just like you who have a story to share or a vision that inspires. If I can share one quick secret with you before we get into the episode, it's that we all have a little bit of visionary inside of us. You know, that spark that nudges us to pursue our full potential in this lifetime. But perhaps somewhere along the line, it got covered up. I'm here to tell you that it's never too late to explore that inner voice and access the brilliance deep down inside of you.

  It's in you. It's in all of us. Let's dive in.
  
  Hey, visionaries. I want to quickly interrupt this episode to talk about masterminds and why they are so powerful. So let me start with a quick story. I used to have such a scarce mindset around investing in my business. I thought that spending money on courses or professional development or retreats, I thought that was an expense against my business.

  And yes, technically it is. But when you really look at it, it's an investment in the growth of your business. And something that I'm super proud of is that I now have a dedicated budget, and I recommend this to all my clients, too. For me, it's about ten to 20% of my take home profits that I am allowed and willing, and I am giving myself permission to invest in personal growth, professional development, joining masterminds, going to conferences, taking courses. So this means that if my business was earning, say, 100,000 a year, I would invest $10,000 to $20,000 into professional development. I know that sounds like a lot. For example, today my business earns a quarter of a million dollars. So this year, I am looking to spend a little over $30,000 in things like going to retreats or joining masterminds or becoming part of professional networks where I know the up level is imminent.

  So this is why you've seen me go to places like Park City, Utah, and spend seven days with high level entrepreneurs just dreaming and thinking. Because I had the budget set aside, and I thought, you know what? I need to get in the room with people who can see beyond my current limitations. This is why I recently purchased a course on Google Ads, and I wanted to up level my knowledge and how I could support my clients even better in this area of digital marketing. And each year, I also choose one mastermind to invest in. So I just invested well over five figures into joining a three month mastermind. And the reason I tell you all of this is because I truly see a trend that those business owners who are willing to reinvest, join groups and not be afraid to get in the room with new people every single month, or at least every single year, those business owners who are afraid to do so, their businesses stall. They feel lonely, they stagnate in their ideation, and they're constantly trying to do everything themselves rather than finding a group of people who can support them and help them rise up much more quickly. So this is where masterminds come in.

  One of my favorite quotes is from Napoleon Hill. He says mastermind groups multiply the mental powers of all participants. So one plus one does not equal two in these groups. And I could go on and on, but basically what I'm trying to say is business masterminds are the perfect way to up level your business. So if you don't already know, my co facilitator, Emily and I launched Wave the mastermind about twelve months ago. And we are so excited to be rolling out fresh new programming. We have brand new content coming at you. Guest speakers like Stu McLaren, who is a membership expert.

  We have someone who's talked to us about how to become predictably lucky. We talk about business finances. We talk about how to make sales fun and easeful. There is so much juice coming up, and I don't want you to miss out. So if you're a driven female entrepreneur, find me on Instagram and dm me the word mastermind so that I can invite you to a free session, no strings attached. I just want you to get a vibe for what happens inside of these groups. So again, you can dm me. I'm at kelseyridal on instagram.

  Just send me the word mastermind and I'll send you an invite. Or head to kelseyreidl.com/mastermind. You can learn all of the details, see what's going on, and you can apply for a free discovery call. So again, kelseyreidl.com/mastermind. Or dm me the word mastermind on insta. Hey, visionaries. Welcome back to a very special episode, at least for me, because this is going to be the episode where I share my birth story. As many of you know, I gave birth to our very first baby, our baby boy, Frederick Freddy, on Christmas day.

  It was totally insane. I never imagined having a Christmas baby, and it's actually so hilarious because I know a lot of people would avoid having a baby on that day. But now looking back on it all, I can see exactly why he chose to come on this specific day. And wow, I have so much to share. So this might be a bit of a longer episode, and I'm going to try to give you as much of the backstory as much of the juicy detail because I know that when I was preparing for labor for the first time, it was so comforting to listen to podcasts and to read the Ina may book about childbirth on the farm. And anything I share today, I will link in the show notes. And I watched birth vlogs and I asked my friends to share their birth stories with me once again. Because when you're preparing to go into birth or to go into labor, it just hits different.

  Prior to that, I really don't know that I grasped how insane an incredible and transformative birth would be. I honestly think I cried every day for the first 30 days, every time I thought about my birth story. And just a caveat, all of this. Number one, I have a sleeping baby on me. So if I seem like I'm stopping and starting the episode, it's probably because I am. Because I don't think I'll be able to do this in one shot. Number two, it's not going to be perfect. I'm giving myself full permission to just sit down, record whatever comes out of my mouth, knowing that I will probably fumble on my words.

  I'm not going to edit this. I'm just going to give you the real situation here, which is that we're prepared and we have notes and we have an outline of how we want to talk about the story. But also, I'm in a season where perfection is not the goal, and instead, I just want to connect with you guys on a real raw level. So in order to prepare for this episode, I actually just kind of sat still for a few minutes and I put on a song that is very meaningful to me. I actually found it while I was preparing a little Instagram post to announce Freddie's arrival. I stayed off of social media for about seven or ten days after his birth. There's no part of me that really likes to share things in real time. So he was born on Christmas Day.

  I think I posted something in the early days of January, and I wanted to do a little bit of an Instagram reel because I have so many amazing connections through the wonderful world of social media. And I thought, okay, now that I've talked to all of my family and friends and texted people, I'd love to share this with the people who I converse with all of the time through social media, through my email list, through the podcast. So I'm scrolling and I find somebody else's birth announcement, someone who I didn't know. And it had this gorgeous song by Natalie Taylor. And the song is called surrender. And as soon as I heard the song, I was almost just moved to tears because the bulk of the song says, whenever you're ready. Whenever you're ready, can we surrender? I surrender. And these lyrics became so meaningful to me because Freddie was late.

  We were overdue. There was a lot of pressure of when's he coming? When's he coming? Are you going to be induced? What's going to happen if he's seven days late, ten days late, twelve days late? And I wish I had this song prior to him coming, because knowing that when he was ready, he was going to come is all I needed to know. And I did tell myself that I really feel that our babies, they know when they want to come. We don't need to force them, we don't need to put ourselves on fake hormones in order to get this baby out. That was my belief. I know for some of you, that was the case, and that was the best option for you. But I wanted Freddie to come when he was ready. So when he was overdue, I felt so at peace.

  And I wasn't panicking. I wasn't worried that he wasn't going to come naturally. Because eventually, every baby's going to come right when they're ready. In the lyrics of the song, they say, can we surrender? Can we surrender to the fact that a due date is just that it's a date, it doesn't mean they're coming that day. They might come two weeks early. They might come two weeks late. And if we can honor the fact that they'll come when they're ready and we just need to surrender and let them kind of walk out their plan of action, I think that's our best option. All right, you guys, so this one might be a doozy, because I already found myself bawling my eyes out listening to that song before hitting record.

  So here we go. I first want to preface this. If you want the really short version, I will link the Instagram reel that I posted that just shares a little bit about my labor, has a couple videos and I'll pop that in the show notes. I think the best place to start, though, is with a brief overview of our conception, journey, fertility, and ultimately with my first pregnancy ending in a miscarriage. And so back in July of 2022, so many, many months ago, I woke up and finally felt like I was ready to grow our family. My husband, Dave, he was definitely ready before I was. For context, at the time of recording this, we are both Dave and I, 34 years old, so we are what some would call older parents. Not that I feel that way at all, but when you consider most people have babies in their late 20s, we started to get the question of, are you guys going to have kids? How long are you going to wait? There were definitely some sly comments of, you know, it's harder to get pregnant when you're older.

  All things that I just wanted to be like, shut the f up. Like, is this your child that I'm having, or is this my child? But the beautiful thing was, Dave and I, we have been together almost 15 years. We met in the Bahamas when we were 20 years old, and we were on a spring break vacation. So it was definitely a travel romance. And we have had such a fulfilling life together. We have moved around to various cities. We lived in Toronto for about seven years, built our careers there, made so many new friends. We lived in Switzerland together.

  We've traveled to Peru. We've traveled to Nicaragua, traveled to Morocco. We've covered all of Europe together. We have explored Central America, and we have adventured so much with one another. We also have rooted down and built such a beautiful life here in Ontario, where we live and where we've bought a home and where we now have a really beautiful community of friends. And we never felt a void. I never felt like I have to have kids right away in order to be satisfied with my life. And so we just kind of kept trudging on.

  Of course, a big part of that, too, is that I was building a business and growing it and really giving it my all every single day to the point where that was kind of my baby, I guess. So I felt very fulfilled. I also have a lot of athletic pursuits, and I'm never really sitting still. So life was certainly full. And I didn't find myself twirling my thumbs thinking, I need to have a baby. But the idea started to really sink in a little deeper in the summer of 2022, or I guess in the spring of 2022. And we had talked about, okay, when do we want to have kids? And what's our timeline and I would just say to Dave, I don't think I'm ready, but soon. I don't think I'm ready, but soon.

  And it was someday in June of 2022, that I woke up, and I just felt ready to start actively trying. Now. You hear so many stories of people saying it happened on the first try. Maybe it takes a few months. So I was really hopeful that that would be my situation. But I also knew that that's not always the case. But I had no indication that things would take a while. So, anyways, I was not on birth control or anything.

  I never really have been. I'm a very natural gal. The birth control pill, way too many weird side effects, and I wasn't willing to mess with my hormones and my period like that. So we started trying right away, and a couple of months went by, still not pregnant. So I was a little bummed out because I was like, oh, dang, it would have been fun. A couple of my friends were in the early stages of their pregnancies as well. June passes, July passes, august passes, and I remember in September or October. So maybe we had been trying for three or four months.

  I remember you're timing your entire life in two week windows. It's like you're either kind of near your ovulation and you're peeing on an ovulation stick, and you're like, okay, this is the window we're gearing up for, or you're getting your period and knowing that you're basically not able to get pregnant for those two weeks. And I just felt like it was this constant two week, two week cycle. If you've ever gone through fertility, you're measuring your basal body temperature, and you're using apps like flow and kindara. You know how all consuming this can be. If you know, you know. If you're trying to conceive, you are trying to conceive, and that basically becomes your full time job, or at least it feels like it, because you want nothing more in the world. Once you decide you want a baby, it is just all consuming, and it's everything in that moment to hope that your period doesn't come that month.

  Now, I remember getting my period a few months in a row, and then in September, I was supposed to get it around Labor Day weekend, and I was kind of feeling like, okay, this really could be the time. Maybe I was making up symptoms in my head, but we were going camping that weekend, and I was like, okay, we're going into Algonquin park, and how much fun would it be to just have a few days off the grid, knowing that I'm in the earliest stages of pregnancy? And I was feeling really good about it. I think I was like a day or so late with my period. So I'm like, okay, this definitely could be it. And so we drove up north. I did not bring my diva cup or my tampons. I get up north and we're about to go into the park, and go figure. I go to the bathroom and I'm bleeding, and I am devastated.

  Have a big, big cry to myself. Come out, obviously tell Dave. Every single month, as soon as I got my period, I'd look at Dave and say, so bad news. And so that happened. I remember in October, same thing. So we tried mid September when I was ovulating. October, I was just going about my day. I was like, okay, this really could be the month.

  I'm a very positive person. I'm always hopeful. And this was month five, I think of trying, and I went to a spin class with my sister, and I'm in the bathroom, and I'm waiting for her to arrive, changing into my spin gear, and go figure, blood pours into the toilet. And I'm like, I'm just devastated. Crying before the spin class happens. November, same thing. It's funny how I can remember every single moment. We're driving up to a friend's birthday party in Blue Mountain.

  We're about to do a day of cideries breweries, enjoy each other's company. And on my way up to blue Mountain, Dave's driving, and we stop at Tim Hortons. And I'm like, dave, I'm going to grab a coffee, but I'm also just going to head into the bathroom. I just have a feeling. I just got my period. And so I go to the bathroom at Tim Hortons. Hey, mama. If you are looking for a space to balance CEO level ambition with joyful motherhood, I want you to go to thewavemama.com.

  The wavemama.com, because us ambitious mamas need to stick together. So again, if you want a space for balancing CEO level ambition, whether you're a high performing corporate gal or you run your own business as a female entrepreneur, but you also want to embrace the joys and the beauty of motherhood and this messy space that we're all navigating as mama entrepreneurs, I want you to go to thewavemama.com, get on the waitlist, because I am launching something really special and I don't want you to miss it. Thewavemama.com in this small little town on our way up and I wipe and there's blood again, bawling my eyes out, absolutely devastated. December, I guess. December, okay, so we were going to arizona on a vacation. Dave and I were going on a mountain bike vacation to Sedona. And I had heard that sedona is a very magical place. And when I said I was going there, a girl messaged me on instagram and she said, I conceived my baby in Sedona.

  And I had not been telling people that I was trying to conceive or that Dave and I were ready to have kids. So it was just kind of magical that she shared that with me and I held that really close to my heart. And even when we planned our trip, and again, these are the psychotic things you do when you're trying to conceive. Originally, we were going to go like really early December, and then I realized, oh shoot, I will actually be ovulating during this week of December. So I was like, dave, what do you think about changing our trip so that we're in Sedona? While I'm ovulating, Dave works a full time job out of the house. So scheduling sex and making sure that we're having sex when he's gone 10 hours a day. And then it's the nighttime and it's dark, that can be a little bit tricky, right? So if you can plan to be ovulating while you're on vacation and spending 24/7 together, that's perfect because you can maybe fit in a couple extra sessions. I can't believe I'm just sharing all this.

  But again, we're going to hold nothing back. So anyways, we're in sedona and we're having a great time. We're mountain biking, we're sitting in the hot tub, and it was just the best trip ever. And come back. We go through Christmas, all the things at the end of December. Sometime between Christmas and New Year's, I take a pregnancy test. Actually, I think it was on Boxing Day or the 27th. So we had just finished all of our Christmas festivities and this is December of 2022.

  And so I take a test, and Dave wasn't home at the time. I think he was working the week between Christmas and New Year's. So I take the test and it's positive. I am bawling my eyes out. We had been trying since June of 2022. It's now December of 2022. And holy shit, I am getting a positive on the pregnancy stick. So I scramble I'm so excited.

  I am just like anticipating Dave coming home. And I'm like, how am I going to tell him? And I had actually printed these onesies that said visionary on them, these baby onesies. And I would gift them to my clients when they found out they were pregnant or when I knew they were having a baby. And so I thought about that, and I'm like, oh, my God, I'm going to go dig up those onesies. And so I grabbed one and I threw it in the laundry basket wrapped around my positive pregnancy test. And that night when Dave got home from work, I said, hey, do you like, is that your shirt in the laundry basket? And he went and grabbed it. He pulled it up, and the pregnancy test fell out. And it was just one of those beautiful moments where we just connected, hugged each other, cried, and we were so ecstatic that finally I knew I could get pregnant.

  Because when you've never been pregnant before and you're trying to conceive month after month, if you have no confirmation that your body can get pregnant, you start to go to some dark places. I was thinking, am I going to have to do IVF? Will we be adopting? What if my body can't get pregnant? What if something's wrong with Dave's sperm? There's so much that needs to happen in order for a pregnancy to happen, right? So I really didn't know. Maybe this isn't in the cards for us. Maybe it won't be easy, like it seemingly has been for all my friends. And it is just so fucking hard to have pregnancy announcement after pregnancy announcement from your friends when you are not conceiving. So to any of you going through this, I see you. I feel you. I know it feels like you've been waiting a lifetime for this baby.

  And I don't have the right words, but if you want to reach out and chat on Instagram, I'll leave my Instagram handle in the show notes. And I'm more than happy to chat. I know in retrospect, waiting seven months to find out you're pregnant is not that long. But to me, it felt like a lifetime. So anyways, get the positive pregnancy test. I go through January pretending I'm doing dry January. So at every social event, I'm like, I'm not drinking this month, and everything's going quite well. And I actually did record my entire miscarriage story, so I will at some point, perhaps share that.

  And so January is starting to pass by, and I'm excited month after or week after week. And I'm still pregnant, I think. Or I go to the doctor, and I just say, hey, I'm pregnant. I don't know what to do from here. She's like, okay, well, you can book in with the midwife. So I officially applied to get a midwife, and the doctor decided to send me for blood tests and confirmation of my pregnancy and a couple of other things. And so I'm at the doctor's office, I pee on the stick, and then she gives me the requisition for blood tests to confirm the pregnancy hormone. And I go do all of it, and I wait, and I can't exactly.

  I'm a little foggy because this was over a year ago, but around the eight week mark, I go in for eight week blood tests. And honestly, I've been feeling great up to this point. I am excited, obviously a little nervous. Anytime you go in for testing and I go in on a Friday morning, I get my tests, and I go on with my day. On Friday afternoon, I start feeling a little crampy, but I'm kind of like, okay, maybe I'm just having back pain or something. Saturday morning, I go to a fitness class with my friend. We are doing an orange theory class. I'm having more cramping, more back pain, and I chalk it up to the fact that orange theory is a pretty tough workout and perhaps I just overdid it the past week and need to lay off a bit.

  By the time I leave orange theory, I am starting to feel like something's very wrong. I call my sister. I'm crying my eyes out. She's in Florida. She's like, kelse, didn't you say you went and got blood tests yesterday? So I say, yeah, I did. And she's like, you know, you can pull up your labs online with life labs. So she's like, facetime me when you get home, and we'll look at them together. So I open them up on my way home, and we see what you don't want to see, which is that your pregnancy hormone is essentially nonexistent, which confirmed that the pregnancy had stopped growing around four or five weeks.

  And I can't even recap that. If you've ever been through that, you're just so heartbroken, right? You get so excited. Dave and I had started to talk about our September baby and the due date, and it's everything when you find out you're pregnant for the first time and when you really want it. And to see that was pretty heartbreaking. So we carried on with our day, we knew that the miscarriage would happen. Sunday morning. I decide to do what I love, which is to get out for a ride with my friends. So we go fat biking in the snow.

  I'm feeling pretty good that day. I'm just trying to enjoy. I didn't tell anyone, but got out. Nice two hour ride through the forest. It was gorgeous. And as soon as I got home, I started to feel a little off. And that's when the whole miscarriage happened. And again, I have a podcast recorded about this, but basically labored this little placenta or whatever it is.

  At that stage out, it was extremely painful to miscarry. I know that's not the case for everybody, but in my situation, it was pretty awful. Dave was just holding my hands, we were crying, and yeah, it was tough. So we did a little burial in the backyard for that little one, and we kind of closed that chapter and knew that we would just keep on trying. And so then in March, I got my period back officially at the beginning of March. And then I timed my ovulation, and I knew I'd be ovulating while Dave and I were in Florida together, which was perfect timing. Another vacation where we would have the opportunity to try to conceive a baby. And I laugh about this with my mother in law now because she says, hey, based know when Freddie was born, I think I know where you conceived.

  It was at our place. So we giggle about that now. But we had a beautiful family vacation. Obviously. We were just excited that I got my period back post miscarriage. I'm back to living in two week cycles of tracking ovulation and all the things. And mid March, we are actively, again, trying to conceive. And I actually got pregnant my first period back after the miscarriage, which was so amazing.

  So, it was Easter weekend, early April. I knew I was either going to get my period this weekend or hopefully not get it and get a positive pregnancy test. And so, Easter Friday, we went out for a beautiful dinner at this amazing restaurant called fume. And we enjoyed cocktails and just had great food. And then I thought, okay, Saturday morning or Friday night. No. I said, okay, this is what happened. So I enjoyed some cocktails and a glass of wine.

  So, yes, I was drinking, had a great dinner. Dave and I had the best date night. And I said okay, because I was so nervous, you guys, to take a pregnancy test. I just wanted to disassociate. I didn't want to know because I was terrified that it would come back negative. You know how there's people who, they just, like, pee on a stick the first moment they're able to. I avoid it for as long as possible because it's terrifying to me to confront the fact that this may not be the outcome I'm hoping for. So I was already a few days overdue.

  We go out on our date night, we enjoy ourselves, and I get back, and I think because I had. There's my baby on my chest, because I had had a couple of drinks, I was feeling a little bit of liquid courage to just do it. And so I pee on a stick, and it was one of those ones with the two blue lines. And I'm not even kidding, you guys. The lines came back like, crisscross, zigzag with a constellation in them. It did not show whether I was pregnant or not. It was giving us signs that, yes, you're pregnant. But it matched none of the positive visuals.

  So again, I feel like I've said this a million times, but here I am stressing out. I'm probably crying again. I run downstairs to Dave, and I'm like, what the hell does this mean? So we are scouring the Internet as to what these line situations mean, because it was not one of the clear yes, you're pregnant. So, so confusing. Dave's on forums for clear blue, reading through, and ultimately he's like, kelse, come down here. You are pregnant. And he compares what we're seeing to somebody else's visual, and he's like, I promise you, this is a positive pregnancy test. So we're thrilled, so excited.

  So we go through Easter weekend, and it was just the best, knowing I was pregnant again. My mom's birthday was on the Tuesday after Easter weekend, so my mom passed away a few years ago, and I had actually told my entire family about our first pregnancy on my dad's birthday on January 6, we were all together, and I thought, even though it's only been I'm five weeks pregnant, I'm just going to tell everyone. Because it's not often we all get together with my sister, my brother in law, my nieces, and my dad. And so I thought it would bring some joy in an otherwise sometimes sad time when we're celebrating things and my mom's not there. So then it's April 11. It's my mom's birthday again. I'm five weeks pregnant, and I'm going out for dinner with my sister and my dad. And so I decide to tell them in that moment.

  Obviously, celebrating my mom's birthday without her is an extremely sad and devastating day. And so I thought I'm going to bring a little joy. So I told my sister and my dad that we were pregnant for the second time, and they were so thrilled for us. So that's a little bit about the journey of conception with regard to pregnancy. I mean, I have so much to share, but I'm going to save that for another podcast. I had such a beautiful pregnancy. I was able to stay active. I felt pretty good, aside from a little bit of fatigue.

  Obviously the ending weeks are tough, but I reminded myself every day that it's so beautiful to have this time to be kidless with baby in your belly when you're winding down your work and you just get to enjoy life a slower pace and enjoy this final chapter of you and your partner and your dog and no baby. So the pregnancy was amazing. It went by slow, fast, I guess, but I feel really grateful to have had such a positive pregnancy. Okay, so let's transition just a touch. And now let's get into a little bit of my birth plan. So as we started nearing the end of my pregnancy, I really started to think about my birth plan, knowing that people say, oh, don't have too much of a plan because it never goes according to plan. But I had a definite vision of what I wanted. And I think as someone who's always been a little bit more holistic, I'm someone who, for better or for worse, does not take medication.

  Or like, I won't even really take tylenol, even if I have a headache. I grew up in a very natural home, grew up being reminded by my mom that when you have a fever, your body just needs to sweat it out. And we don't have medication in the house, so fight it off, and we're not going to rush you to the doctor for every little ache or pain you have. So I've always been bred with this mindset of our bodies are tough and resilient and capable of so much when we give them the right tools, right. When we feed our body really well, when we don't bring chemicals into the home, when we sleep really well, when we build muscle, and when we're out in nature and we're active and we take care of our mindset, your body is so capable, and oftentimes it has the ability to heal itself or to support itself through challenging times. So again, some of you may not resonate with me on this philosophy, but I've always been very confident that my body has the answers and can navigate tough health situations. So I'm not somebody who overly relies on my doctor. In fact, I gave up my family doctor many years ago.

  And yes, there have been situations where modern medicine has saved me. Yes, I have taken antibiotics and am so grateful for the care that we have here in Canada. However, I also am a big proponent of being my own advocate and just knowing that oftentimes we have the answers, we don't need to outsource our power, especially as it relates to our health. So I knew right away I would go with a midwife. And I did. I went with Cambridge midwives who were love loved working with them. And with midwives, you actually have the choice to do a hospital birth or a home birth. So in my birth plan, I knew in my heart I wanted to have a home birth.

  And I'll just pause right there because I'm assuming anyone listening, you either just got a visceral reaction of, oh, my God, you're crazy. That's so dangerous, or you're like, oh, my God, go you. I also had a home birth, or I wish that my partner would have let me have a home birth. The amount of times I heard that was actually crazy. And so I am somebody who's very curious and open to other people's perspectives. So when I was kind of concocting my own birth plan, I also was starting a community called Visionary Mama, which is where I'm sharing this podcast, an email newsletter, and I also started an Instagram broadcast channel. And there's about 100 people in the channel. And I ask people about their birth stories.

  And what do you think about home birth? And I don't ask because I'm looking for opinions or advice. I ask just to create conversation. And people can say whatever they want, and it doesn't rock the boat in my world. And so I had asked about what people thought about home birth, and it was crazy how polarizing it was. I had people tell me, message me back, that is the most irresponsible thing you could do because birth is a medical emergency. So I'm like, okay, that's cool. Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts. And I had people say home birth was the best decision of my life.

  It was magical. It is what we as women are meant to do to birth in a supported place where we feel comfortable. And I had everything in between you guys. So I'm very open to all perspectives on birth. But the more I started watching birth vlogs, I found myself gravitating towards home birth vlogs. I was reading the guide to childbirth by Ina May. And there's hundreds of stories in there, most of them home birth, some of them transfer to hospital. But I just was enamored with these home birth stories.

  Or in this book, they're birthing on the farm. And if you've read the book, you know exactly what I'm talking about. And when I listened to podcasts, I often gravitated towards people who were preparing for home births. And so I knew in my heart I really wanted to have a home birth. And I felt so confident. I know some people would say, oh, I could never do that. You got a birth where you're comfortable, right? When you close your eyes and envision your most magical birth, where is that? And you'll immediately get a visual. I also had a bit of a hesitation with the hospital.

  The last time I spent a lot of time in the hospital was when my mom died, and it was not a pleasant experience. I mean, when your mother dies, that's the most devastating moment of my life thus far. And that was at a hospital. And I really didn't want to be back in that environment. And I love our house. So I prepared for a home birth. And my husband, bless his soul, he's so trusting in me. He always is willing to expand his mind and to have conversations, and he would never override the decision saying, no, it's in a hospital.

  He fully supported me. He said, I want to learn more. Can I ask the midwife questions? What happens if he definitely is more on the side of caution with things like this when I bring up what could be seen as a radical idea. But ultimately, we decided this was the best plan for us, and we were so excited. So in preparing for birth, I listened to one of my good friends, Sarah Monica's birth story podcast. I will link that in the show notes. And she had a successful home birth. And one thing that I thought was really neat was that she actually wrote down, prior to giving birth to her son, what she wanted her birth to look like.

  So she essentially manifested, I want it to be at night or in the morning. I want the snow to be falling. I want baby to come early. I want baby labor to only last x amount of time. And again, to some of you, you're like, you're crazy. You don't get to control that. And then there's some of us who straddle the real world and the spiritual world. And I thought, you know what? I am going to manifest my dream birth.

  So I'm going to read you exactly what I wrote that I wanted I wrote the prompt down or the journal question, what would birth look like if I were to say, hell yeah, that were amazing at the end of it all. So I wrote down, I want it to be at home. I'm hoping to move in labor between the bedroom, the bathroom, the family room, and the birth ball. I want low, dim lighting. I would love to have my early labor happen through the night. So I wrote from 05:00 p.m. To 05:00 a.m. And then to be pushing and meeting the baby in the am at some point.

  I was hoping baby would arrive December 18, 19th, 20th, or 21st. So on the due date or slightly after. I only wrote this all down on December 17. So the day before my due date, I was hoping my labor would be 12 hours start to finish or less. I was hoping the snow would be falling and that I would feel warm and cozy because it was Christmas time, and we had our tree up, we had the decorations, all the bells and whistles in the house. I love Christmas time. And if you remember at the beginning, I know exactly why Freddie came on Christmas day. It's because Christmas, since my mom died, has not been the same.

  She was the one who decorated our childhood family home, hosted the dinner, bought all the presents. So ever since she passed, Christmas has been very different. Right? We're not doing dinner at my childhood house anymore. We're not doing presents anymore. Things aren't decorated, and we're not getting trays full of cookies. Of course, my sister and I have taken over hosting, and we still cook our typical Christmas Eve german meal. And it's beautiful and it's wonderful. But without my mom around, Christmas is very different.

  Right? We're making new traditions at this point. And so, looking back on it all, Freddie came on Christmas day to say, hey, guys, Christmas is going to be joyful again starting this year. So it's pretty special, I think. My mom, someone said to me on instagram, your mom's just holding him extra tight right now, giving him some extra love in the spiritual world. And she'll release him when she's had those extra snuggles, and she brought him on Christmas day. So pretty special to have that new meaning to Christmas these days. So, anyways, I'm listening to Sarah Monica's podcast, which I will link in the show notes about her birth story. I end up writing my own manifestations, and then I kind of move on at this point.

  Prior to going into labor, I had also taken a empowered birth course. So shout out to Jerry Tate. I will link her in the show notes. She has a wonderful course that basically goes through your rights as a birthing person. How has the birth system changed? What will you do if you are told you have to do something like go in for a c section or be induced? Do you have the right knowledge to move through your birth in an empowered state? Highly recommend this course if she's still selling it. I learned a lot about the industry of birthing. I also took an amazing course. It was the blissborne hypnobirthing class from Christine, and she's the founder of COA birth.

  If you want to learn hypnobirthing, I. E going into self hypnosis while you're in labor so that you can manage the pain, I would highly suggest this. My birth plan was to have a natural birth. So I did not want an epidural. I did not want a c section. I wanted to go into labor naturally and get through all my contractions naturally. I guess I did have a lot of laughing gas. Spoiler alert.

  I think that still makes it natural. That's just gas and air. So anyways, hypnobirthing with Christine of coabirth. She's out of Guelph, Ontario, but we did it online. Was an incredible class, and I will link her in the show notes in case you also want to take a hypnobirthing class now. Dave and I did this together. It was five weeks every Tuesday night, and we loved it. Not only did we learn a lot about birth itself, but we also practiced self hypnosis together.

  We practiced our let go triggers, so how we would release when I was in a lot of pain, and it was just really good bonding time for us. It was 10 hours that we got to spend together, total thinking about birth and preparing and just being together and imagining how we would move through this crazy experience that neither of us knew what to expect. So again, what I did to prepare, obviously work with the midwife team, supported my health through pregnancy by working with Dr. Rachel, Dr. Rachel Coradetti Sargent. I will link her in the show notes and then took Jerry Tate's empowered birth and coa birth from Christine, her hypnobirthing class. So those were all game changers. Highly recommend, all of them.

  I also felt so confident in home birthing and in natural birth because people said, kelse, you're an athlete. You know pain, you know how to go deep, you know how to shut your mind off and just work for what you want. And I think people saw my racing and mountain biking and the fact that I can do cold plunges. And that I do have a strong mental state. Even after my mom passed away, after we had some pretty intense family stuff. Go on. I had this ability to just be strong when I needed to. And I knew I had been working my entire life for giving birth.

  Like every strength workout I've done, every meditation that I have taken or gone through, every cold plunge where I've been in the ice cold river, every time I've gone on a mountain bike ride or a gravel ride or a road ride or a fat bike ride. And I have suffered because my friends are faster than me. And it's hard to keep up. It's hard to go for that third or fourth hour of a race when your body is exhausted, but you go to the deeper place, go a layer deeper. What do you really have inside of you to give? Is this pain going to kill you? What happened if you shut your eyes and just tuned out the noise of the world and you just got through this? And I just had this feeling, I can do it. I can get through a home birth. I am not going to let this pain kill me. I'm going to be okay.

  I'm going to get to the other side. This too shall pass. Labor is temporary, right? And whatever needs to happen will happen. And so now we can move into the part of the birth story where I am nearing the arrival of Freddie and teaser alert. Nothing went to plan in some ways. And everything went to plan in some ways. The ambulance ride at 11:30 p.m. On Christmas eve going so friggin fast and me transitioning in the back of an ambulance and my midwife telling me, do not push right now, that was not in my plan.

  But can I look at it now and say everything happened perfectly? I absolutely can. So that's where we're going in the next part of this birth story. So thanks for staying with me. So I want to first rewind to December 22. So on December 22, we were nearing all the Christmas festivities. A couple of my girlfriends were in from out of town, and obviously I was four days overdue at this point. My due date was December 18. And side note, I actually think my due date based on conception was December 14.

  But regardless, when they measured baby, they said it was the 18th. On December 22, I was four days overdue, had the day free, and I ended up going out for brunch, uptown Waterloo with a bunch of my girlfriends from high school. And during that brunch, we were just chatting, and I was very pregnant at the time. And they were saying, oh, do you think you're going into labor soon? And I thought, well, I haven't had any signs or symptoms yet, so I didn't really think so. And I was telling them how I was obviously a little bit sad and wondering, will I be going to all the Christmas festivities? Should I go grocery shopping? Should I go buy all the presents? Right? Like, will we be participating in our Christmas activities? And I just had no idea. And there's definitely a weird sentiment when you're overdue, because everybody's asking you, hey, just thinking of you, or they're sending you messages, you're on my mind today, or, how's everything going? Or any updates? Or people were texting me saying, has baby arrived yet? And I'm like, screw off. Clearly not. So I tried to post little updates on Instagram every day just to reassure people, I'm still here.

  I'm still pregnant. Please do not text me asking if baby has arrived, because obviously, I will let you know when I'm ready. And so I wasn't concerned. I was at brunch, just chatting with my friends, and I was saying, should I go buy the red cabbage or should I not? Because one of the dishes that I planned to bring over to my sisters on Christmas Eve was the red cabbage dish, which is a traditional german side dish that my mom would always make for us, in addition to our schnitzel, roulette, spetzel, mashed potatoes, german green beans, Christmas cookies, all the fixing. So anyways, they said, you know what, Kelsey? You'll probably end up buying the cabbage, and that'll be what puts you into labor. So just go buy it. So anyways, that day happens. I leave brunch on the 22nd, and I drive home.

  And, of course, when you are nine and a half months pregnant, you have to pee all of the time. All of the time. So I get home, I rush into the bathroom, because it was a 45 minutes drive from brunch to my house, and I immediately go to the toilet, and I'm peeing, and I glance down in the toilet, because, as you do, and I see this big, goopy globber thing, and I knew right away, I think, that's my mucus plug. So I had lost my mucus plug, and I took a photo of it immediately and sent it to my friend Alexa, who's a midwife, and I said, is this my mucus plug? And she said, yep, that's definitely it. And then I texted my friend Krista, because I knew she lost her mucus plug before she went into labor. And I said, how soon after you lost your mucus plug did you go into labor? And she told me, oh, it was like, x amount of hours. And so I thought, oh, my God, I could be going into labor today. So get through the rest of the day, nothing.

  Get through the whole day on the 23rd, nothing. I go to bed that night. So this is kind of where the real story begins. So I go to bed on the 23rd. I had just gone for a big walk that evening. I was chatting with my friend Greg. There was a beautiful proposal that happened on the bridge over the river outside of my house. And Dave and I were out back.

  It was pouring rain. It was such a shitty day outside. And we were, like, taking pictures of this proposal. It was so cute and cheering for them and ringing our cowbell. I come inside, and I'm like, all right, I'm just going to go to bed. So I go to bed, and I wake up at 02:00 a.m. So this is 02:00 a.m. On Christmas Eve.

  And I kind of just, like, shot awake with period cramps. And so I got out of bed because when you're that pregnant, you get up a lot. You have a bit of insomnia. So I wake up at 02:00 a.m. I'm kind of like, okay, I'm feeling a bit crampy. This could be the start of labor. They told me to take gravel if you start to feel cramps coming on. So I go downstairs, grab the gravel that I had bought.

  I had already, obviously, at this point, prepared my home birth kit. The house is ready to go. The bed has the sheets right there, ready to change. All is good, and we're just waiting, right? And so I take the gravel, I go back to bed, and then I wake up on Christmas Eve around 07:00 a.m. And I'm feeling totally okay. So at 07:00 a.m. Christmas Eve, I'm like, all right, so maybe you're not coming before Christmas. And obviously I'm feeling a bit deflated because when I had woken up at 02:00 a.m.

  I thought, oh, my God, this could be it. And then to wake up that morning and feel totally fine. Yeah, I just had another just low point, I guess, of thinking, what's going on? Am I going to have to get induced? Will they let me go 14 days over, even though I was nowhere close to that, but I was just a little bit panicked. So we actually had an ultrasound booked for that day. So at 11:00 a.m. On Christmas Eve, we drive to Cambridge hospital, and we get an ultrasound. And during that ultrasound, I start to feel like these little contractions come on. Which was really interesting.

  And the ultrasound technician actually said something to me like, hey, I think you're having contractions. And, oh, wow, baby looks healthy, and how are you feeling? And, oh, my gosh, what if you had a Christmas baby? And Dave and I are in the room, and she's so pleasant, and we're like, oh, yeah, we'll see. Kind of thing. We leave the ultrasound. I'm feeling a little bit crampy, a little bit off, but nothing crazy. And so as we're driving home, the hospital is about a 25 minutes drive away. As we're driving home, I'm like, you know what, Dave? We should probably just stop at the grocery store. Let's grab red cabbage.

  Let's grab the stuff to bring a salad on Christmas day. Let's prepare ourselves for a few days of festivities, just in case, because clearly, baby's not coming today. So we stop at the grocery store, we grab all our stuff, and we continue our journey home. And just as we're pulling into our house, I said to Dave, you know what? I would really love to go see our friends. Our friends always do. And normally, we are part of it. We do a float down the river on Christmas Eve. So we put our paddleboards, our canoes, our kayaks into the river, and do a half hour float with drinks, and we dress up in Christmas attire, and it's just really fun.

  And so I'm like, okay, well, we missed the float because of the ultrasound, but wouldn't it be fun to go meet them at the finish line? So instead of driving home, we go straight to the finish line, and we're standing on the river, and they're coming down in their boats, and they're all dressed up in Santa Claus gear, and they're just having the time of their life. And so we welcome them in, and we're chatting, and everybody's hanging out, and everyone's saying, oh, my gosh, Kelsey, you're still pregnant. How's it going? And I'm like, yeah, I'm good. I'm good. I'm feeling a little bit off, but all is well. So we socialize for an hour. We get invited back to our friend's house, but I'm kind of like, nah, Dave, we should just go home. And thank God we did.

  So we get home, and immediately when I get home. I'm like, okay, I feel a bit off, but why don't. We're going to Christmas Eve dinner. It starts in 2 hours. I'm not in labor, so let me start cooking the red cabbage. So I start chopping. I get out the dutch oven and I start cooking the onion and the apple, and I put in the red cabbage, and I'm starting to stir it and tend to it. And as I'm standing over the red cabbage stirring it, I feel a gush.

  And I'm like, oh my God, I think my water just broke. So I run to the bathroom with a glass and I collect a little bit of it, and I'm like, okay. So I guess I call the midwife now. And at that moment, my phone rings and it's my brother in law. And he's like, hey, so I guess you're still coming at Christmas Eve. Don't forget to bring your skate so we can go skating. And I'm like, hey, john, I don't think we're coming. I think my water just broke.

  And he's like, oh, okay, I'll tell your sister. Call us back. And I'm like, okay. So I hang up the phone, and I'm like, dave, I think we need to call the midwife. So we page the midwife, she's like, okay, so your water just broke. What color was it? And I tell her it's a dark yellow color. And she's like, what? I'm going to need you to come into the hospital. And so she's like, I'm at a home visit right now.

  Can you meet me at the hospital at 330? And I'm like, oh, God, yes. So we pack up the car. We have about half an hour to get to the hospital. So we drive right there, and she's like, meet me in the labor and delivery ward and we'll confirm what's going on here. So she brings us into the delivery room and she's like, I'm going to run a series of tests and just see what's going on. Because if your waters are yellow brown, we're afraid that there's maconium inside of it. And in that case, you would no longer be cleared for a home birth. And once again, I start crying and I imagine my birth plan going out the window.

  I'm terrified, because again, at this point, I don't want to have a hospital birth. I'm not comfortable with that. And I see my dreams of a home birth going out the window. And so she does all the tests. She's like, after 20 minutes. Okay, we can, in fact, confirm your waters are broken. And we also can confirm there is no maconium in them. You actually collected urine.

  A little embarrassing to say, but I guess when I ran to the toilet with my cup to collect my water, I peed, and I collected urine instead of the water. So she's like, you're good. Go home, and you can still have your home birth. So we get in the car, and we drive home, and we get home around 04:20 p.m. So I forget exactly what happened when we walked in the door. But like I said, we get home a little after 04:20 p.m. And I think immediately my contractions started coming pretty intensely. And I had made a worksheet for Dave to start tracking everything.

  That's like, my neurotic brain. It just basically had what's going on, what worked, what didn't work in comforting me. And I asked him to take photos and videos throughout my labor, which he got a few, but definitely was not priority. And in retrospect, I'll just share this right now. I really do wish I hired a videographer. Not a photographer, but somebody to do video. I don't know how that would have looked or how it would have felt to have someone there, but if somebody was just passively there, like, truly staying out of the way. My eyes were closed my entire labor in order for me to get through the pain and to manage, I was in my own world.

  It was just darkness behind my eyelids. And so I don't think having a videographer there would have threw me off at all. And I would have loved, loved, loved, loved to see how beautiful the whole experience was. Even as crazy as it was. I just think, to date, that is my most exciting, thrilling, most intense 10 hours of my entire lifetime. So why wouldn't I want that on video? And I think I would have watched it back. And even thinking back to mine and Dave's wedding, my only regret, and not really a regret, because I don't regret anything, but if I could have done one thing differently, I would have had a videographer at the wedding, because I would have loved to see the energy on the dance floor and to see the visuals of who was there and how they were interacting and how the water was flowing on the lake when Dave and I got married down by the water. And I would have loved to see the food and people socializing and them cracking a beer or drinking a glass of wine and laughing and who each person was sitting at their table with and meeting for the first time.

  So same thing with the labor. I would have loved to see it all unfold. So if you are somebody who's kind of like, oh, I would love to hire, just do it. Find the right person, obviously somebody with good energy that you don't mind having in the room. But I think that would have been really cool. So, yeah, we got home from the hospital. Contractions started about every four minutes apart. I was timing them.

  I was writing them all down in my phone. So after each contraction, I'd pop open my notes app and write down the time. And I started laboring on our couch. So I just had a comfy outfit on, pants, and a zip up, and I was on the couch in the family room, and I was basically just in, like, a downward dog or I guess more like child's pose position and figuring out, what is this pain going to be like? And it just kept getting a little bit more intense. So basically, at that moment, I'm like, Dave, you better go prep the house. Make sure the bags are packed in case we need to go to the hospital. Prep the bed, dim the lighting, grab my heat pack, grab some ice. Really just kind of getting everything going.

  And it was really starting to feel so real at that point. And in between one of my contractions, I actually looked at Dave, and I started crying, and I said, I'm scared. Like, this is the end of life as we know it, right? That was what came over me. Of our lives are about to change after 14 years of you and me, we're bringing a baby into this world today or tomorrow. And I didn't know if I was ready. I mean, I don't know if anyone's ever ready, but it really hit me in that moment. It was like excitement, anticipation, but also just the most unknown. How is this labor going to go? And so again, I'm timing my contractions.

  At 05:30 p.m.. I actually moved down to the bathtub. I asked Dave to run the tub downstairs. It's a big, deep soaker tub, and I labored down there, and it felt really good to be in the tub. I remember my groaning and moaning getting so much louder with each passing contraction. Again, my contractions were three to four minutes apart. And when they really got down to three minutes apart, we called our midwife, Corinne. She was the on call midwife.

  And it's so funny, because when you call them, they kind of want to see, like, are you able to talk? How much pain are you really in? And so Corinne said, put me on speakerphone, because Dave had called her. And so she said, I'm just going to chat with you, and I'm going to hear what's going on. And of course, at that moment, I had a contraction that wasn't very intense, and they were spaced out. I swear, that was the only one that was easier. And I wasn't moaning and groaning, and she was like, okay, yeah, it sounds like you might be starting to progress. And I was like, no, I swear, they were three minutes apart and really intense. But she said, okay, I'm going to pack up my stuff, I'm going to drive to the office, grab some laughing gas, and then I will be at your place. And so she arrived about an hour later.

  I just remember thinking, like, when you have no idea how labor progresses, you just wonder, is she going to be here fast enough? What's going to happen in the next hour? It would be nice to have someone here. And I know seasoned midwives are like, well, I'm not going to come so early, but just in this unknown bubble, you just have no idea. You don't know what you don't know, right? So I'm in the bathtub. We had brought speakers down. We have a sono system throughout our house. And the playlist that really was working for me was just frequencies. So if you go to Spotify and type in frequencies, it's just like a certain hertz or frequency of playlist, and it's just almost ambient noise. But I loved having that on.

  So I had that on the entire time that I was laboring. During contractions, we did do the hip squeeze, the double hip squeeze that we learned in hypnobirthing. And then the heat pack really helped, as well as ice packs. I think for the most part, I wanted the heat pack, and I had bought one a couple of weeks prior at Walmart because we didn't have one yet. So that was all awesome. Corinne arrived around 07:20 p.m. She was my midwife, and she asked me to get out of the bathtub when I was ready so that she could assess me. So I got out.

  I put on a robe that my friend Alexa had bought me. She was like, oh, all nursing mamas will need a robe. So I put on this brand new robe that I had never worn before, and Corinne's like, come upstairs to the bedroom when you're ready. And I don't remember this, but Dave remembers it. He says, I could barely get up the stairs. Like, I, midway up the stairs, got a contraction. And was needing to pause in our stairs. We only have like ten of them, so they're a very short staircase.

  But anyways, I get upstairs, I get onto the bed. Between contractions, she checks how dilated I am and at this point I'm about 4 cm dilated and progressing well. And at that point she's like, do you want me to bring in the laughing gas from my car? And I was like oh yes, I don't know. I've never had this stuff before, but let's do it. She also brought something in called a tens machine and I basically had a little clicker around my hey visionary. I want to interrupt this episode to share a little bit more about one on one coaching. I work with clients who want to stay on top of the latest marketing trends, who want to bring more ease into their marketing funnel or just build a marketing funnel in the first place because maybe you don't have one yet and ultimately take the effort and overwhelm out of your marketing plan. I know your energy is limited and you just want someone to tell you what to do.

  Should you be on threads? Should you be creating on TikTok? How do you grow an email list? What does SEO mean? Anyways, this is why I offer private one on one business and marketing coaching for business owners like you who need help with their marketing strategy. You can head to kelseyridal.com privatecoaching to learn exactly what it's going to look like if we decide to work together. And I'm excited because I can give you the precise strategies that will take your business to the next level this year. So if you want to learn more kelseyridal.com slash private coaching of course, it is a bit more of an investment than any of my other courses or offerings, but my private clients are seeing crazy results. Christina landed a six figure consulting contract. Emily signed six clients in one day. Barb had a Black Friday sale that generated a lot of money, and these are all based on the strategies that we've implemented. So kelseyridal.com slash private coaching.

  You can learn all about it. You can see all of the amazing visionary businesses that I've worked with and supported over the last decade and I can't wait to see your application come through. Kelseyridal.com privatecoaching now back to the episode. My neck and she attached the pulsing stickers to my back and so I could turn up and down these nerve impulses. Definitely look it up. I did find that it was helpful, like it wasn't revolutionary, but I'm really happy that she offered me the tens machine. And I think if you're going to go through a natural labor, it definitely is helpful. The laughing gas is, I mean, it's next level helpful.

  I would say during each contraction, once I got the laughing gas going, I would put the gas mask up to my face, and I would inhale really deeply. Exhale. I'd be in so much pain, I would do it again. Inhale, exhale. And usually by the third time I inhaled, I had some relief. I felt a full body high. And I actually looked at David Corinne a couple of times, and I said, I am so high right now. And it's funny because with lapping gas, the moment you stop inhaling it, it stops working.

  And side note to that, I remember once Freddie was born the next day and boxing day and the 27th, I was like, why is my throat so sore? It felt like I was getting sick, and it felt like it was closing up, and I had this scratchy voice. It's because of the amount of laughing gas I inhaled. I was going at that thing, and at one point, Dave said to me, kels, take a breath of air. Because I was really going at the laughing gas. I actually went through, I don't know if the tank came full, but I went through one machine, and I was like, if she did not bring a backup machine, I'm going to lose my shit. And she's like, don't worry. I brought the backup. So they replaced the tank, and I continued to labor.

  So I actually labored in bed from about 720 all the way up until 11:15 p.m. Things were going well. I dilated from about 4. So really, every hour I was dilating by a centimeter. And honestly, I was coping well. Like I said, my eyes were closed the whole time. Dave and Corinne were kind of hanging out outside of the bedroom. But as soon as I would have a contraction, Dave would run in, double hip squeeze heat pack, and just be there in case I needed anything.

  Offer me a juice. Really, I don't think I drank much water. I just wanted apple juice. And that would be my number one tip, is have jugs and jugs of apple juice. Because even immediately postpartum, I drank so much juice, I can't even tell you never had that much juice in my lifetime. And I was very sweaty. So I think I had lost a lot of fluids, a lot of electrolytes. So around 11:15 p.m.

  On Christmas Eve, so everyone's probably winding down their Christmas dinner and wrapping up for the night and got their family time in. And here I am, laboring 8 cm dilated on Christmas Eve. Just totally a unique Christmas. So Corinne, my midwife, decides to check my cervix to see what's going on down there. And I believe she said there was some sort of fluid sac around Freddie's head. And so she asked me if she could go in and just check on it and move it. And so, yeah, we said, sure, go for it. Like, anything to help continue dilating to get my cervix to move out of the way.

  And I don't exactly know how to explain this. I'd have to bring on my midwife or ask her for clarification, but essentially, when she moved this fluid sac or went in to kind of pop it, it burst, but it had maconium in it. So a huge gush came out of me. It obviously stank like poo. And at that point, because of the risk of baby inhaling it, a midwife has to transfer you to a hospital. So she said, based on what has just happened, we're going to need to call an ambulance. We do need to get you to the hospital right now. And I could tell she was a little bit nervous and just kind of looking at Dave, like, hey, pick up the phone and call 911.

  So things get pretty exciting from this point forward, because I'm in my own world. I'm about 8 cm dilated, moving pretty quickly at this point to needing to push. And so I don't really remember Corinne and Dave talking, but I think I kind of remember Dave picking up the phone, calling 911. From Dave's experience, from his story, he was scared shitless. At this point, it's just scary to call an ambulance, to know you're transferring. It's very fast. Once we called the ambulance, they arrived within four minutes. So being that we were going to have a home birth, we had our hospital bags packed, but we weren't really planning to be there at the hospital.

  So within four minutes, like Corinne's saying to Dave, go grab your stuff. I'll get all my stuff packed up. Kelsey, you just do what you're doing. Four minutes later, the ambulance has arrived, and we have two paramedics that walk in. I feel so horrible. I'm like, am I ruining people's Christmas Eve? My poor midwife can't be with her family. The paramedics that are on duty now, I'm making them work, and they walk in, and it's two very young paramedics. The guy walks in and again, my eyes were closed.

  I was in my own world. But I remember him just saying, hey, what's going on in here? How's everybody doing? Oh, there's a dog here. So it was really funny. I'm just like, what the hell? I can't even think of talking to you. And I remember him saying to me, how are you doing? And I was just like, I don't know. This might be the first time in my life that I've basically just ignored somebody who was trying to be kind to me. I'm sure he understood. So anyways, after assessing the situation, when they got here, my midwife said, hey, can you drive us to Cambridge hospital? Because usually they would take you to the closest hospital, which would have been Brantford, but the midwifery clinic that I went with, they operate out of Cambridge hospital.

  So luckily, the paramedic said, yeah, we're not busy tonight. We're happy to drive you to Cambridge. So that was awesome. Corinne came with me in the ambulance. So they got me onto a stretcher into the back of the ambulance. They asked Dave to take a car, grab his stuff. They were like, do not follow the ambulance. You're not allowed to chase us.

  And he was like, oh, okay, I'll drive my own route. And that's really all I remember. I remember them shutting the ambulance door. I was in so much pain in that moment. And I remember being in the back of the ambulance. The lights were so bright, I had nothing to grab onto in there. Like, everything was kind of boarded up in there, and it was just a slippery wall. So during contractions, I just remember almost using both of my hands to try and climb the wall just to grab anything, because there was nothing to grab.

  My midwife is in the back chatting with the female paramedic. They're talking about, oh, my daughter's in paramedic school, and, oh, how long have you been. And here I am yelling, screaming. I was actually saying to my midwife, I have to push. And then sometimes I'd say, I have to shit. If you've ever transitioned or if you've ever approached that point where you need to push, you probably know exactly what I'm talking about. You have no filter. Nothing is holding you back.

  It's just like, I don't give a shit what people think of me. And of course, that's not even on your mind. My midwife is telling me, don't push. Don't push. Hold it in. I don't want to deliver this baby in the ambulance. And I just remember the paramedic, the guy who was driving? He drove so goddamn fast, like, this is normally a 30 minutes drive. He must have got us to the hospital within 20 minutes.

  Wow. So we get to the hospital. This is actually our third time at Cambridge hospital in a single day. Because if you remember, at 11:00 a.m. I was there for an ultrasound when I wasn't in labor, at 03:30 p.m. I was there to check if my waters had broke and I wasn't really in labor. And now it's 11:30 p.m. And I am back at the hospital once again.

  And they wheel us off of the ambulance into the same delivery room where I was hours earlier, getting my waters checked. And pretty much I get there. They strap me up to the bed. They put me. I didn't even have a chance to get in a gown. So I'm still in this beautiful bathrobe that Alexa bought me as a gift. Not the best laboring outfit. And I had, like, a scrunchie in my hair.

  Like, just. I wasn't. Wasn't thinking I was going to the hospital that evening. So, anyways, from the time I arrived, I had my eyes closed the whole time. I didn't want to open them because I was just staying inside. I was really just deep in my own pain management, and it was honestly all going quite well. So hospital transfer was, some would say could have been traumatic. But, I mean, it just is what it is, right? Like, I have zero regrets looking back on my labor.

  So, anyways, we get into the hospital, they wheel me in, they start hooking me up to things. Heart rate monitors, fetal heart rate monitors, whatnot. Dave arrives, the backup midwife arrives. And it was Emily, the same girl who had done my check at 03:30 p.m. That day. And I felt super confident in the presence of the room. And so I continued to dilate, continued to labor. I had laughing gas, and things were going really well.

  So I did transition into pushing maybe around 1215. So quite quickly after arriving to the hospital, what I remember about that phase was that the midwives got me to scrunch up my legs. So I was basically tucked into a ball, knees towards my chest, knees towards my chin. And with every passing contraction, I wanted to yell, like I was the type of person that needed to be audible and releasing. But they kept saying, close your mouth, tilt your chin to your chest, and keep your noise in. And funnel all of that energy down towards the birth canal, which was really challenging because that went against my nature. But again, I was on my back scrunched, and I would just go. And so I kept everything in.

  My lips were sealed, and I would just push with everything I had. I did feel so weak in some of my pushing. I think just general fatigue, and sometimes it's just hard. And then in between, I would have laughing gas. So they had Freddie hooked up to fetal heart rate monitor, and they could tell after about 45 minutes of pushing that his heart rate was dropping. And I think Dave was pretty scared at this point, but he stayed strong. And I would just look at him and say, water. I was so dehydrated.

  I was sweating so much. I don't know if anyone else listening sweat so much. During labor, I had pools of chest, like, you know, in between your boobs, you have, like, a little concave where your sternum is that just kept filling with water. And I was just. The photos of me post birthing Freddie, I was just wet. Disgusting. So at some point, the midwives felt a little bit concerned about Freddy's heart rate, and they called in the OB that was on call. His name was Dr.

  Strauss. He's a seasoned Ob. And honestly, he came in, and I just remember popping my eyes open at one point and thinking, wow, this guy, he's going to save the day. He knows exactly what's going on. And we are so grateful that he was the OB on call. He monitored for a bit. He saw what was happening. I remember him standing with his arms crossed.

  He had a mask on. He had kind of like a cover on his head and hair. He looked like he was ready to attack a surgery or just, like, ready to handle the situation. I didn't know what he was thinking, but every time I looked at him, he was just studying the heart rate monitor. He was studying each contraction that I had. And at a certain point, he had a conversation with the midwives. The midwives conversed with him, and they came in and basically said, all right, at this point, we are going to move things forward. And, Dr.

  Strauss, the OB is going to take over a bit of control here. We're going to try the vacuum, which is like this little suction thing, three times. If that doesn't work, we're going to have to move to forceps, because he said that doing the vacuum more than three times could end up in brain damage for little baby. So forceps would be the alternative. So at this point, we're looking to get baby out. I'm starting to fatigue because I've been pushing for about an hour. And I was totally confident in whatever he suggested. So kind of going from this, hey, I'm going to have a home birth to, oh, my God, this baby's not coming out or needs to come out faster.

  I thought this would have derailed me a bit more, but I just felt so good about the whole birth and the whole presence of the room, and everybody just was meant to be there. I don't know how else to say it. Going from somebody who was very resistant to a hospital birth to feeling like, this is exactly where I need to be was a really beautiful situation. So Dr. Strauss came in. He had three attempts using the vacuum. You can always look that up, and what it looks like, it's just like a little suction. And Fredy still didn't come out.

  He decided to switch over to the forceps. And so each contraction, Dr. Strauss went in there with the forceps and was ready to pull them out. I had no idea how long this pushing phase was going to last. I was like, is this going to be an hour and a half? Is it going to be 10 hours? I don't know. Are they going to ask me to move into a c section? I don't know. And I think Dave was really worried that we were moving towards c section if the forceps didn't work. And so I contracted once.

  Forceps in. I'm still on the laugh, or, no, I think they told me I couldn't use the laughing gas anymore. So I'm just in full blown pain now. You have no inhibition, just letting it all out at this point. Contraction two comes, and they're telling me, push with everything you have. Kelsey. He's so close. We can see the so, so close.

  Or they weren't saying he, because we didn't know if it was a boy or a girl. Contraction three comes, and I feel my body weakening. I don't know that I can push any harder. And at one point, I had a contraction, and I thought I didn't even do anything. There's nothing to give. And even though they were squeezing me and telling me, push, push, push, I just felt like nothing was actually happening. But I was trying my best. I never, ever gave up, which I'm really proud of in this labor.

  And then the fourth contraction came when the forceps were inserted, and I just push, push, push, push, push, push, push. And I literally think everyone was saying, push, push, push, push, push, push, push. And I did it. That contraction. I had no idea what was happening down there. And apparently baby came out in one swift motion with the use of the forceps. And at that point, Dr. Strauss takes the baby, flips him upside down.

  I didn't see this, but Dave saw it. I guess this is an old technique to kind of clear the fluid from their lungs, flips them upside down. We hear the cry, and baby comes right towards my chest. And immediately Dave exclaims, it's a boy. And that was such a cool moment. I was not in it at that point. I felt very disconnected. I was just so happy that it was over.

  Labor was over. I laid back, and I just kind of was in my own head for a sec, just going, wow, thank God. Dave was looking at Freddie and looking at me. I was laid back. Didn't even really know they're putting a baby on my chest. I didn't feel immediately connected to this child. I just kind of sat there and was like. Or was laying there like, I'm hot.

  I'm so dehydrated. I need a minute. Freddie started crying. So, yeah. Dave exclaims, it's a boy. Immediately, they do the cord cutting. I think we had asked for delayed cord clamping, but I don't know what exactly happened there. It didn't happen.

  Freddy's on my chest. I'm laying there. Dave's crying. I look at Dave, I say, are you okay? And the OB, the doctor says, why are you asking him? Are you okay? And then the OB proceeds to say, if men had to give birth, we'd be extinct by now. So that was pretty funny. But Freddie was born at 01:37 a.m. On Christmas day. So anytime I see this number, I will always think of Freddie and that special day.

  And Freddie was the first Christmas baby at Cambridge Memorial Hospital. And so they brought him this little Christmas hat, and it didn't fit. They brought a little newborn hat. His head was so big that it didn't fit. He was born at nine pounds 1oz. And so they said, oh, let's go back and grab another one. So they found a bigger hat, and that fit him. And so at that point, the pediatrician was there.

  The nurse was there, the OB was there. I birthed the placenta. I don't really remember. I was so out of it at that point. But I did birth the placenta. I think they gave me the shots in my leg, or. I don't know. It's kind of a blur, to be honest.

  I did require stitches, so he stitched me up. I didn't even feel it at that point. After you've gone through labor, they could add all the stitches they want down there, and I wouldn't have even noticed. I just was, like, laying there. I had no idea what was happening. I'm like, what? I birthed the placenta. How did that happen? I didn't even feel it. So that was all good.

  And within an hour, we had gotten all his measurements. The midwives were starting to pack up and doing all their charting, and I could tell they were tired. So I'm really glad the delivery was succinct and all things considering, quick. And that was it. Gosh, where do I want to go from here? I mean, it was absolutely the best from that point forward. I cannot imagine a better Christmas day. We were wheeled up to the labor and delivery or the prenatal or baby ward at about 04:00 a.m. So for 2 hours, we were just in the delivery room.

  Dave got to hold Freddie. We took photos. I was just in awe. I just remember it was the most magical feeling, and that magic kept going. We got up to the ward room where we were going to be staying for the next 36 hours, because after they use the vacuum on the baby, they want to monitor their head circumference. Oh, and I guess I forgot to say we named him Frederick. Frederick erwin drago, born Christmas day, 01:37 a.m. And freddie.

  We just loved that name. Frederick has german origin, and it was one of the boys names that we loved. We love a lot of, like, classic 1920s, 1930s names. Erwin is my dad's name, so we named him after my dad. And drago is his last name, which is his dad's last name, so. Freddie Irwin Drago. So, yeah, we get up to the wardroom at 04:00 a.m. I got wheeled up there in a wheelchair.

  We get settled in. We're the only ones there because it's quiet that day. There are not a lot of c sections or inductions on Christmas Eve and Christmas day, so it's actually the least popular birthday, which is wild. And I just can't believe we had a Christmas baby. It was the most special Christmas day ever, and we knew all of our family would be together that day. Dave had actually called my sister and his mom on the way to the hospital when he was driving after the ambulance, just, like, in so much panic. He had no idea. Neither of us had any idea what to expect.

  And so my family and his family knew that I was in labor and that we were going to the hospital, and so they were all so thrilled to wake up that day. That morning and see messages from us that said, baby is here. Everyone's healthy. We didn't tell them if it was a boy or a girl right away. We didn't tell them the name. We just reveled in time as a family. Around 05:00 a.m. We realized we had forgotten all of the hospital bags in our frantic transfer.

  So at 05:00 a.m. Dave actually drove back from the hospital, back to our house, took the dog out, threw out the bed sheets, and he grabbed so much food, all of our comfort items, brought them back to the hospital. He was back around 07:00 a.m. It was a really foggy day on Christmas, and it was, like, rainy and much more mild than the usual Christmas. And just being in the hospital with that fog. And we had this beautiful room that overlooked the golf course in Cambridge. It was just surreal. And I've never felt more joy, more peace, more contentment, more.

  I was just like, cloud nine. Best day of my entire life so far. You're just in shock and disbelief as you look at your little one and how perfect they are, and you just can't believe this whole process of growing a baby and being pregnant. And we would look at him and we'd be like, it sounds so biased and so silly, but we'd be like, he's perfect. He's perfect. Perfect. And we learned how to swaddle him, and we just sat up staring at him, and we. God, it was just the most magical 36 hours in the hospital.

  And all of our families messaged us once we told them the news that he was the best gift ever. And they were right. Presents have never mattered to me. I'm not really a fan of physical gifts. I love experiences and kind words. And so this was the icing on the cake that I never want a present again. I never want a physical object. I don't yearn for things.

  I yearn for the moments where life just hits you and it's beautiful, and you're with the people you love, and you are a billion percent present. And that's it. You're just present with the life in front of you and grateful. And that was exactly that. So in reflecting on my manifestations of birth, I wanted to birth at home. And we mostly did. We mostly labored at home. So I would say that was a success.

  I wanted to move between the bedroom, the bathroom, the family room, and the birth ball. And I did just that. I didn't use a birth ball. I found that during labor. That was the last thing I wanted, but a lot of people love it. I wanted low lights. And yes, I in fact did get that because it was dark outside. Basically he was born a few days after the solstice, so the shortest days of the year.

  So it was dark when I went into labor at four. I wanted early labor to be through the night from 05:00 p.m. To 05:00 a.m. And yes, I started labor around 04:00 p.m. And he was born at 01:00 a.m. And if you remember, I wanted to push and meet baby in the a. M. We met Freddie at 01:37 a.m.

  I wanted Freddie to arrive between December 18 and 21st. He actually came a bit late. So he came on the 24th and then obviously, or started laboring on the 24th to 25th. But he gave Christmas a whole new meaning. So I love that. I had manifested 12 hours start to finish and it was less. It was 04:00 p.m. Until about 01:37 a.m.

  So was that 10 hours I was hoping for. Snow falling, warm and cozy. And there was no snow, just the fog and the rain. But it was the perfect weather to lay in a hospital bed. The next six weeks, we proceeded to have the most sparse amount of sunlight that we've ever had. In Ontario. It only got sunny, like two days, but it was perfect because I was sitting on my rocking chair, learning to be a mama and recovering. So I felt like it was such a great time to just stay indoors.

  It was a warm and cozy labor, warm and very sweaty, actually. And so I would say all of my birth manifestations came true, which was really cool. And yeah, our stay at the hospital was magical. We were getting gifted blankets and stuffed toys and diaper towers for having the first Christmas baby. And the nurses and the staff were all so kind. My midwives came to see me and check on me and took some pain meds for what was going on. And on boxing day, we got discharged and that was really fun. We walked out of the hospital just enamored with this little one, and everything felt so magical.

  And I was like, oh my God, I'm craving coffee again. So we drove right to Starbucks, got a just. I chugged it so fast. Dave had had one sip of his coffee and I was already done my grande pike place. It was so funny. He's like, did you just finish that? And so we started our drive home and we were just driving so slow. And on our way home, we passed our best friend's house because it's on the way home from the hospital. And we're like, should we stop and see if they're home? So we stopped and we called them.

  We said, are you guys home right now? They was like, yes. So they ran out and we just gave them big hugs and cried and just showed Freddie off. And then we went home and spent the rest of the day, just us three, as a family. And it was so perfect. And then on the 27th onward family stopped by. It was so fun because it was Christmas holidays for everybody, so we had lots of visitors and the house was all decorated for Christmas. People brought over Christmas gifts and Christmas snacks, and it was just incredible. So there you have it.

  That's the birth story. That's the long short as much as I can possibly share. And I'm about seven weeks out now, so some parts of me wish that maybe I recorded this a bit sooner, but I did actually write down the entire birth story within the first week, so it's all been written, so I knew I wanted to get it out of my head and onto paper. Dave and I both wrote our own versions of the birth story, and on our date nights over the last seven weeks, we've taken time to read them to each other. So that was really cool to hear the different perspectives. And, gosh, it's just been so amazing from there. We've had tons of special moments. We've just loved being parents.

  We are smitten. Don't listen to anything anyone tells you. I had the weirdest messages from people saying, like, prepare for pure exhaustion or, oh, my God, it's hell to have a newborn. That has not been my experience. There's something about once you've gone through loss, you are just so grateful for this child. Your energy is just pure excitement and joy. So happy to share more on my experience. Obviously, this can be a very unique time.

  Like, your baby might be colic, your baby might not be easy, but I have learned so much and I have had the best seven weeks of my entire life thus far, and I'm just so grateful. Freddie's healthy, he's happy. There's been a few little concerns, but we are just so lucky that he's here and we can't get enough of him. Honestly, it's been the best seven weeks of my life. I feel like I am a rebirth version of myself. I'm better in all ways. I'm more driven and motivated and happy, and I'm living in this blissful state right now. It's truly crazy.

  With each passing week, I feel like you start to forget. You start to lose that blissful feeling. So I'm really trying to channel that. And again, I just never want to forget how beautiful the whole experience was. And hearing Dave recount back to me how amazing it was to see his wife in labor and how proud of me he is and how crazy it all was, he's like, you grew that baby. Like, I will never forget that. And I am eternally grateful that you gave us the gift of this life. He says he has a whole new respect for women, and I did ask him if he wanted to record this birth story with me, but he said, no, I'm good.

  He's more of a private person, and I always respect that. Yeah, that is the birth story. If you have any questions, any comments, whether it's about conception, miscarriage, pregnancy, planning for a home birth, my birth story postpartum, I'm a pretty open book, guys, so feel free to reach out. I am happy to chat about it. I am excited to just continue reveling in this experience of becoming a parent for the first time. And my hope is that if you are pregnant, if you are going to be giving birth, write down what you want. Know that you've got this. Know that your body is so goddamn capable.

  Women have been doing this forever, and you can do it too, right? And I'm so glad that. I feel as though I've trained my entire life for this. I felt like just taking a course wouldn't have revolutionized how my birth went, but doing hard things always and knowing that I can get through anything that put me in the right state of mind to handle this entire experience and to move through it very joyfully. All right, guys, I am going to wrap it up. I love you all. If you've listened till the end, I appreciate you and would love to hear your thoughts. What did you think of the story? Do you have any similar through lines with how your birth went? And I can't wait to connect with you guys. So enjoy the rest of your day or your evening.

  Connect with me on Instagram at Kelsey ridle. And if you want to stay in the loop of all things visionary mama, head to kelseyridal.com slash mama. I'll put the link in the show notes, and I'll talk to you guys soon. Hey, visionary, have you been thinking about creating an online course? Perhaps you've always imagined that you want to teach new puppy parents how to train their dogs. You want to show new mamas how to prepare their bodies for natural childbirth, you want to share the secrets behind the best ever sourdough baking. Well, all of that is possible when you build an online course, and perhaps it's been on your mind forever, but you've been putting it off. You really want to launch a brand new income stream, but unless there's a deadline, you feel like you're not going to get around to it. So what if I told you that in just 8 hours, we could help you to create and learn to market and sell this online course of yours? Well, this is possible if you live in southwestern Ontario.

  We are hosting a one day event for the second time called online Course complete. This is happening on Friday, May 10 from nine to five in Guelph, Ontario. The best part is we get to hang in person for a day. It's going to be a really interactive workshop and we're going to give you everything you need to create, launch and sell your course. Early bird rates are on now, so if you do want to come, you'll definitely want to head over to ww kelseyridal.com slash occ. Again, that's kelseyridal.com slash OCc and we're going to help you to finally start making money on that course idea of yours. So if you're passionate about a topic, if you have an idea and you want to stay accountable to getting this course done in just 8 hours, definitely join us at online course complete and let's tackle this course once and for all. We're so excited.

  There's only 15 spots available. Kelseyreidl.com occ thanks for tuning in to this episode of Visionary Life. I love bringing you these conversations on a weekly basis, so it would mean so much to me if you could help me out by rating and reviewing the show on either iTunes or Spotify. It just takes a second and if you don't want to rate the show, you could also just take a screenshot of the episode and share it on your social media platform of choice. Tagging me at Kelsey Reidl. I'll catch you in the next episode. Quick break, because I want to share a really exciting opportunity for all of the local entrepreneurial women in southwestern Ontario. If you are looking to connect with like minded female entrepreneurs who share your passion for all things life, health, business, building, relationships, connecting, we are going to be hosting meetups in Pusslinch, Ontario at the cutest Lakeside market and our first one filled up so fast that we've decided to host a couple of more through 2024.

Tune into the episode.

https://link.chtbl.com/visionarylife

Tune into this episode with on your podcast app of choice:

• Spotify

• iTunes

• All Other Podcast Apps

If you’re searching for an Online Business & Marketing Coach for your Business, rest assured that you’re in the right place.

I've helped over 200+ people to launch their business, go full-time, get fully booked, and become #1 with The Visionary Method

Mentioned on the Episode:

• The Mastermind by The Visionary Method™ and The Magnetic Life™: Join an intimate business mastermind for women who are running online service-based businesses, and who are looking to plug into a community of other powerful leaders who are ready to grow in their health, wealth & relationships. Hosted by Emily Elliot (Mindset & Success Coach) and Kelsey Reidl (Marketing Consultant).
  
  Click here >>> https://www.kelseyreidl.com/mastermind

You Might Also Like:

• 260 | Behind-the-Scenes of my NEW Meditation Journey

• 283 | The 8 Year Old Trip Down Memory Lane That Changed My Entire Future

• 304 | Behind-The-Scnees of the BEST Business Mastermind For Female Entrepreneurs