Today's birth story episode features Marissa Lawton who discusses getting pregnant with PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome) and dealing with fertility treatments. Marissa is a military spouse and discusses the experience she had giving birth at a military hospital. She experienced vast differences between the day and night shift of doctors and nurses and was in labor for over 30 hours.

Marissa also discusses the anxiety she dealt with about infertility, about whether a fertilized egg would be viable, how many babies she would carry and whether her baby would be healthy throughout her pregnancy.

She also explains that her anxiety also caused her to make birth choices she probably wouldn’t have otherwise. For instance, she wanted a natural birth, and did deliver vaginally, but was induced (41 and 5) with pitocin and ended up having an epidural after feeling unsupported by some of the hospital staff. Marissa also dealt with a strong nesting instinct that manifested almost like OCD.

She was apply to rely on prenatal yoga to help with anxiety and practiced it all throughout her pregnancy and wishes she could have listened to her yoga training during labor including bodywork over what the doctors were saying that didn't feel right.