A Simple Framework for Any Pregnancy or Birth Decision

Pregnancy Podcast

Vanessa Merten

Newborn, Parent, Homebirth, Vbac, Kids & Family, Doula, Firsttimemom, Midwife, Pregnancy, Doctor, Parenting, Pregnant, Vanessamerten, Physician, Csection, Prenatalcare, Breastfeeding, Naturalbirth, Nursing, Birthcenter, Family, Baby, Hospitalbirth, Health, Obgyn, Research, Trimester, Expecting, Labor, Mom, Diet, Dad, Birth

4.5 • 948 Ratings

🗓️ 8 June 2025

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

You will have numerous opportunities to opt in or out of interventions during your pregnancy, at birth, or with your newborn. You always have options regarding your prenatal care and birth, as long as you know what those options are. In an ideal world, every procedure would come with informed consent, providing you with all the necessary information to make a confident decision. However, in the real world, constraints like limited appointment time make obtaining proper informed consent challenging. There are five straightforward questions you can ask. When used together, these questions become one of the most versatile tools you can apply to any decision, whether navigating prenatal care, choosing interventions to implement during labor and birth, or making crucial choices for your newborn.

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Read the full article and resources that accompany this episode.

Join Pregnancy Podcast Premium to access the entire back catalog, listen to all episodes ad-free, get a copy of the Your Birth Plan Book, and more.

Check out the 40 Weeks podcast to learn how your baby grows each week and what is happening in your body. Plus, get a heads up on what to expect at your prenatal appointments and a tip for dads and partners.

For more evidence-based information, visit the Pregnancy Podcast website.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You are listening to the pregnancy podcast with Vanessa Merton.
0:10.4	Hello, thank you for tuning into the pregnancy podcast.
0:15.0	In today's episode, we're going to talk about five essential questions to navigate procedures
0:20.4	and interventions. You're going to have a lot of
0:23.5	opportunities to opt in or opt out of interventions in your pregnancy, during your labor and
0:29.0	birth, or with your newborn baby. You always have options as long as you know what your
0:35.1	options are. In a perfect world, every procedure is going to come
0:39.4	with informed consent. So you're going to have all of the information that you need so that you can
0:44.5	confidently make an informed decision. In reality, constraints like limited time available for
0:50.9	appointments can make proper informed consent a real challenge. There are five
0:56.6	simple questions that you can ask. And when these are used together, this is one of the most
1:02.1	versatile tools that you can apply to any decision. And that goes for whether you're navigating
1:07.4	prenatal care, choosing which interventions you want to employ during your
1:11.7	labor and birth, or making critical choices for your baby. You can find the complete article
1:18.3	and all of the resources for this episode at Pregnancypodcast.com slash questions. Right now, you have access to the last year of episodes. There are hundreds of
1:32.6	episodes in the back catalog on every topic for pregnancy, birth, breastfeeding, caring for a
1:38.9	newborn. You can become a pregnancy podcast premium member and access the entire back catalog of episodes.
1:47.0	All of that content is ad-free.
1:49.6	Plus, you'll get instant access to a digital copy of the Your Birth Plan book.
1:54.4	That walks you step by step through creating your birth plan.
1:57.5	There's also many sample plans and even a template you can download and customize.
2:02.9	If you want to try Pregnancy Podcast Premium for free, right now you can try it for free for seven days at
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