Transform with Leisa Masters: Stories of birth and life

On this episode I talk with Gess Adana, a talented and caring doula who felt held back by her imposter syndrome. She shares with us how she broke through this block and discovered a whole new way to work with Muslim women. Using her background in hospitality, Gess delights her clients with incredible nutritious offerings and in-person mothering gatherings. Gess also has a passion for the personal work and the transformations it brings to birth preparation.​Gess can be contacted via her @gess.adana.birthwork or her website gessadana.comMusic credit: Vanlig by Jahzzar (CC BY-SA), Slow Epic by Lite Saturation (CC BY-ND) - Free Music Archive

As an experienced freebirth doula, Saima Kara (livewildbirthfree) shares her own experience of her decision-making through preconception, pregnancy and birth. She takes a deep dive into her own conditioning and behaviour, and how investing in support helped her be aware of her own ability to self-sabotage. One year on, Saima reflects on her birth story, rejoicing in its simplicity, and acknowledging how easily in the industrialsed maternity system it would have most likely been derailed. Saima can be contacted via her Instagram @livewildbirthfree or her website livewildbirthfree.com Music credit: Vanlig by Jahzzar (CC BY-SA), Slow Epic by Lite Saturation (CC BY-ND) - Free Music Archive

Danielle shares how as a doula she became disillusioned with the commonly-held New Zealand narrative that they have the 'gold standard' of maternity care. After seeing so many women traumatised and abused, not just in hospital but at homebirths too, she started to delve deeper into what was actually going on. Forced to examine her own behaviours and conditioning, Danielle began to see what was really needed to help women in their births. Danielle can be contacted via her Instagram @daniellejamescoaching or email: daniellejamescoaching@gmail.com Music credit: Vanlig by Jahzzar (CC BY-SA), Slow Epic by Lite Saturation (CC BY-ND) - Free Music Archive

Kelly shares her story of following her calling to become a midwife in her teens. Despite her desire to serve women, Kelly found herself unable to do so, in a system set up to hurt and control. Even though she continued to seek out models of care outside the hospital, she found over time, they kept moving towards medicalisation and betrayal, and led to her burnout. This eventually culminated in her leaving the system, to unlearn decades of indoctrination and arrive in a place of caring for women how she'd always envisioned. Kelly can be contacted via her Instagram @bloom.birthkeeping or email: bloombirthkeeping@gmail.com

Barbara, originally from Brazil, shares how her powerful first birth experience led her to become a birth educator and doula. She wanted women to know the lessons she had learned that had helped her navigate the hospital system. But as time went on, Barbara began to witness and hear so many birth stories, especially from foreigners like herself, which made her realise the education course she was teaching wasn't enough. This coupled with her doula work and attending births in hospital, began to take its toll on her mental health. Barbara knew it was time to make a change. Hear how she decided to walk away from her thriving birth education business to start offering the type of work with women that really lit her up. If you would like to find out more about Barbara's work in Brazil, you can connect with her via her Instagram @barbarafeliciano_br And if you are interested in her birth support for women who don't live in their home lands, please contact her English Instagram page @barbarafeliciano_birthmentor

My friend, author and writer Kim Lock shares with us many of her life lessons. She talks about her shock first pregnancy, and its traumatic post-partum, and how she became a breastfeeding and mothering mentor. Kim explores her change of career from graphic designer to published author, and the devastating affects anxiety and panic attacks have had on her ability to live her life freely. And finally, she offers up the wisdom she discovered by learning to find and value her true self.

Overcoming the birthing culture she grew up with in Brazil, Carolina chose to birth her first baby at home. She was then devastated by a hospital transfer that led to caesarean, as well as the appalling after-care she and her baby received. Carolina is then faced with an unexpected pregnancy, and is overwhelmed by fear and her need to know all the things. To have the birth she wants she knows she must go deep to prepare. When her partner reveals his fear and trauma and wants her to birth in hospital, Carolina continues to do the work so she can believe in her ability to freebirth her baby.

After her own five births, Claudia shares how as an emerging birthworker it became vital for her to understand her decision-making, and to recognise how deeply it had influenced each of those births. Claudia reveals her regret upon realising that so many decisions in her life have come from a place of pleasing others and how ready she is to release herself from that. As both a Muslim woman and a radical feminist, Claudia shares with us her love for female only spaces, the prejudice Muslim women face in hospital births and her vision for Muslim women globally reclaiming their power for their births.

After birthing her first baby in a midwife assisted homebirth, Tina knew she wanted her next baby to be born at home alone. But after the death of her beloved father altered her whole world, her ability to step into this space of responsibility fell apart. Hear how Tina cycles back to herself to reclaim her power to birth exactly how she'd always envisioned, and filled with absolute love.

On this episode I talk with Nelle from Wild Wombyn – a folk herbalist. After running her birth business for several years Nelle realised it was no longer working for her. Hear how she taps into what she truly loves, moving past her blocks to create a business working with plants and nutrients, that lights her up. Diving deep into old habits and finding ways to release them, enabled Nelle to take radical steps in her life including reaching out to connect with her biological father in a move she'd been afraid to make her whole life. Join me as Nelle describes her vision of women reclaiming their ancestral knowledge of wellbeing for themselves and their families.

Pregnant and feeling in optimal health, Lorraine receives news that sends her world crashing around her. Through this lens she discusses how she went on to navigate the hospital system to birth her baby naturally. High on the satisfaction of her birth outcome, Lorraine then fell victim to a system and society that does not know how to support the breastfeeding dyad.  In intimate detail Lorraine describes the exhausting and despairing cycle of sabotage she endured that brought her to rock bottom. She goes on to describe her transformation of learning how to trust herself and her baby to see the truth of what was always in front of her.

Rebecca reveals her unique family structure, how she came to terms with witnessing a traumatic birth that wasn't her own and preparing for her own first birth experience with new fears and old patterns. Rebecca is a master reflector and an evocative storyteller. Her pregnancy cracked her wide open, no longer allowing her to ignore aspects of herself that had previously held her back. Journey with Rebecca and her family as she confronts her biggest fears so that she can be witnessed birthing as her whole magnificent self.

I'm joined by Claire, who worked with me to birth her business The Primal Dyad. After Claire experienced a difficult breastfeeding journey, she knew she wanted to help other women. She wasn't quite sure what this would look like, and she also knew she had her own healing to do first. Listen to Claire as she shares how she discovered her own unique path to support breastfeeding women and the story of how she healed her own trauma. Claire talks about how she moved through her personal blocks in starting her business and how she learned to recognise her own self worth so that she could go on to create the life she desired for herself and her daughter.

Mali examines the stories of birth she'd been raised with and the subsequent influences that helped her reshape those stories. With a new view for her birth, Mali prepared for her home birth. However, through this process she continued to scrutinise her feelings about her care-providers who's comments jarred with what she wanted for her birth. Mali goes on to share her arduous but perfect freebirth with us describing it as the birth she needed to have.

Beck shares with us her distressing experience of pregnancy loss at 15 weeks and how that led her to seek out more support for her next birth. Beck talks about the process of discovering what type of birth she wanted but how her self-sabotaging people-pleasing behaviour meant she didn't put her own needs first. Beck goes on to share with us how reflecting on her traumatic birth experience led her to once and for all, address her life-long destructive behaviours. She shares with us how through this transformation process, she ultimately found her happiness.

Ashlee shares with us how she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in her 20s and how through self-awareness and connection to her body, she became her own healer. It was from this foundation that she made the leap into a self-directed pregnancy and planned freebirth and she reveals how aligned it felt to her life philosophy. Ashlee also talks about her grief for her breastfeeding journey that did not work out how she hoped and shares with us how she moves through the ups and downs of mothering in this day and age.

I met Karen several years ago when she approached me to work with her as she planned to birth her fourth baby vaginally after three previous caesareans. In this podcast we discuss how Karen realised that her fear was just too great to let go of and how after a long labour where she navigated difficult hospital policy, she decided to have a fourth caesarean. Karen shares how, since her son's birth, she has been striving to master her fear in all facets of her life. Karen also gets vulnerable talking about her mothering style and how disconnected she was from her first three children. She shares that through self-reflection she has learned how to love herself and what that now means for her family.

Justine joins us to share how she overcame her tumultuous indecision so that she could freebirth her first baby in autonomy and joy. She recalls in detail how difficult the process was to take full responsibility for the birth she wanted and show up for herself by releasing the deeply held blocks that she knew were holding her back. Justine describes her birth to us in all its ordinary and extraordinariness.

Emma shares with us her first traumatic birth experience and the vulnerable story of how her second birth did not turn out the way she hoped. Emma tells us how owning her decision-making has meant a transformation of her life and her mothering, and shares with us what ultimately led to her discovering a sense of freedom.

Gemma shares the story of her first unsupported birth and delves into her feelings of isolation during the following years and tells how she found healing during the preparation for her next birth. Gemma talks about how her healing led her to take back her power and make the system work for her so her pregnancy and next birth were on her own terms.

Join Kay as she shares her first birth that did not end the way she hoped and the subsequent work she did to transform her next birth into exactly what she wanted it to be.

Lacey shares the birth story that has shaped her life and her work, discovering the meaning of true autonomy as she euphorically birthed on her own terms.

Ana shares her epic journey and the birthing wisdom she gained as she navigated first an unplanned caesarean, then a coerced caesarean, followed by a VBA2C and then finally birthing her fourth baby breech in the privacy of her own home surrounded by only her family.