Ask the Doulas Presents One Way Or A Mother (with Dr. Elliot Berlin, DC)

Ask the Doulas is proud to present One Way or a Mother to our listeners. One Way or a Mother is a brand new long-form narrative podcast from Dr. Elliot Berlin, DC, host of The popular Informed Pregnancy Podcast. Each ten-episode season follows one pregnancy and all the decisions, emotions, preparations, and history that goes along with it. Interviews feature the expectant mother along with husbands, parents, doctors, doulas, and surrogates.

In season one, listeners meet Arianna, pregnant with baby number two after a less than empowered first birth experience. Follow along over a ten episode arc as we hear the background that brought Arianna to where she is today before embarking on her current journey - that of a proactive pregnant mom using her lived lessons and current resources to create a different, more positive birth experience this time around. Included in each episode are interviews with Arianna’s important pillars including her mom, husband, doula, doctor, and other practitioners important to her process. Subscribe to One Way or a Mother to follow the rest of Arianna's journey. 

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Transcript

Ask the Doulas is proud to present One Way or a Mother to our listeners. One Way or a Mother is a brand new long-form narrative podcast from Dr. Elliot Berlin, DC, host of The popular Informed Pregnancy Podcast. Each ten-episode season follows one pregnancy and all the decisions, emotions, preparations, and history that goes along with it.  Interviews feature the expectant mother along with husbands, parents, doctors, doulas, and surrogates.

In season one, listeners meet Arianna, pregnant with baby number two after a less than empowered first birth experience.  Follow along over a ten episode arc as we hear the background that brought Arianna to where she is today before embarking on her current journey - that of a proactive pregnant mom using her lived lessons and current resources to create a different, more positive birth experience this time around. Included in each episode are interviews with Arianna’s important pillars including her mom, husband, doula, doctor, and other practitioners important to her process.  Subscribe to One Way or a Mother to follow the rest of Arianna's journey.

Zach:  We’re a week away – or maybe not.  Maybe it’s today.  Anywhere from today or two weeks from now, I think, because the last birth was the opposite of what the goal was.  I think there was a lot of pressure on this one, a lot of anticipation.  But ultimately, as long as baby comes out healthy and Arianna’s healthy and we have him and he’s home – I think it’s going to relieve a lot of pressure and anxiety, and everything else will fall into place. 

That’s Zach.  He and his wife, Arianna, are expecting their second baby.  Their particular story is one of a pregnancy path often traveled, but seldom discussed.  They’ve invited us along for the ride and given us front row seats.  I’m pregnancy focused chiropractor Dr. Elliot Berlit, and you’re listening to One Way or a Mother, a serial podcast where we take an entire season and explore one intricate, deeply personal, and circuitous pathway to motherhood. 

Not everyone has a formal birth plan or even much of a plan at all for how they give birth.  But those who do, whether in writing or not, have a vision of their birth, the setting, their providers, and a host of other details that are important to them.  A birth that doesn’t go according to plan can generate feelings of fear, sadness, guilt, and failure, even when the mom and baby are completely healthy.  I’ve witnessed this experience many times with my patients.  Sometimes, for example, it’s a woman who wants an epidural but isn’t able to get one in time.  Or one who chooses Cesarean birth but labor starts suddenly and moves quickly, resulting in an unexpected vaginal delivery.  But most commonly, I see it happen with unexpected Cesarean birth, and it’s particularly impactful for women who are planning little or no intervention and didn't contemplate at all the possibility of a C-section.  If you or someone close to you has had this experience, then you’re going to relate to Arianna and Zach Lasry.  

Arianna:  I did a lot of drugs, had a lot of sex, found myself in really strange places.  I mean, I should have died several times. 

That’s Arianna – or that was Arianna.  Since college, she found love and settled down somewhat.  Today, she’s a filmmaker who writes, produces, edits, and owns her own production company.  A couple of years ago, she and Zach had their first baby.  But things didn't go exactly according to plan.  Now, pregnant again and planning a better birth experience, she finds herself processing the generational and other traumas that led to her own birth, the birth of her first child, and everything in between.  

Hey, it’s Dr. Elliot Berlin, and I hope you’re enjoying this episode of One Way or a Mother.  If you love real, raw, and inspiring stories about the many different paths to parenthood, take a moment right now to follow One Way or a Mother on your podcast app.  We’ve got an incredible season ahead and even more amazing stories coming in future seasons.  And if you’re looking for even more great content on pregnancy and birth, check out our Informed Pregnancy podcast.  That’s where we dive deep into expert insights, real birth stories, and the topics that matter most to growing families.  Plus, we have incredible guests like Hillary Duff, Mandy Moore, Kat Von D, and Claire Holt sharing their personal birth experiences.  For even more, Informed Pregnancy Plus hosts dozens of documentaries and streaming video content focused on pregnancy, birth, and parenting.  You can watch on the Informed Pregnancy apps for Apple, Android, and Roku, or stream online anytime at informedpregnancy.tv.  So after this episode, follow One Way or a Mother and check out the Informed Pregnancy podcast and Informed Pregnancy Plus.

Arianna Lasry, welcome to the podcast. 

Arianna:  Hi.  Thanks. 

What the audience really needs to know is, you’re the perfect person for this.  You’re very easy to talk to.  You have, thankfully, a very dramatic story, or this would be boring.  I mean, if your birth was just like, oh, a piece of cake… You have a great sense of humor, and this is important.  You don’t really have a TMI button.  You’re super open.  It’s a little bit of a looser podcast, this one, with no TMI.  Let’s start at the beginning.  Where are you from originally? 

Arianna:  Manhattan Beach, California. 

How was that, growing up at the beach? 

Amazing.  It’s so wonderful being a kid near the beach.  I didn't realize it was paradise until a year out of it, and then you come back and you jog and there’s a sunset and you’re eating a bagel and Jamba Juice, and you’re like, oh, wow, I’m from paradise.  Cool.  Awesome.  Why did I go all the way to New York to have to learn that?  I don’t know.  I did. 

If we’re going really to the beginning, do you know much about your own birth when you were born? 

Arianna:  Yeah.  My mom loves to share that story.  So I was born at Cedars, where I birthed Wilder and where I will birth this next baby.  It’s all coming full circle.  She had a hospital birth, but she was very determined to have me naturally, and she loves to say how she was, like, super fierce in defending her own right to have a natural birth, but she told me about how she had these really supportive nurses, but they said, you better get that baby out before the doctor comes back.  Otherwise, the doctor is going to intervene.  So my mom talks about just hauling butt to get me out of there.  She did it naturally, and she’s super proud of the story. 

Alex:  I started contracting at home in the morning.  Like, it woke me up.  The contractions woke me up. 

That’s Alex, Arianna’s mom.  I asked her to join us to share her experience in her own words. 

Alex:  So probably between 5:00 and 6:00 a.m., and I’m like, oh, something’s happening, but it’s not time yet.  I want some breakfast.  This is one thing that – I mean, you forget things when you’re pregnant, like, you’re not supposed to eat when you go into labor.  But I was hungry.  So her dad made me an English muffin and an egg and all that stuff.  So contractions were getting a little heavy, and I ate my breakfast.  Now I’m going to take a shower, because I don’t want to go to the hospital dirty.  So I went in the shower.  All of a sudden, it’s like these big contractions are happening.  Next thing I know, I’m on all fours and I’m throwing up.  There goes the breakfast.  This is more serious than I thought!  So then we started timing them, and they were getting to be, I think, five minutes apart.  So maybe we should make our way to the hospital.  And once we were there, we got into the room, and for two hours, I did not dilate.  I was only at six centimeters.  And she’s like, you’re not progressing at all.  Nothing was happening.  Are you sure we shouldn't break your water?  Because my water hadn’t broken.  I said nope.  An hour and a half, nothing.  I’m still at six.  Within 40 minutes after that, I fully dilated, and I really wanted to start pushing.  And then they had to go hunt the doctor down, because she was already thinking it was going to take a lot longer.  Found her, she came, and she’s like, oh, my gosh, you’re at ten centimeters.  But my water still hadn’t broken.  She was like, don’t push, don’t push.  I really wanted to start pushing, but then they took a monitor and were trying to hear the heartbeat, and they couldn't hear the heartbeat.  Then they started panicking.  And I’m thinking, if you can’t hear the heartbeat, it’s probably because the baby’s in the birth canal.  So they wheeled me into an OR, and now I was not happy.  So I’m looking at her dad, and I’m like, don’t let it happen.  Do something.  Please advocate for me here.  We get in there, and she says, I’m going to get forceps just in case.  I had this wonderful nurse, and she looked at me and said, okay, I know how you want to do this.  So before she comes back, you got to push her out.  This nurse was amazing.  She took my hands, and she looked me in the eyes, and she said, come on.  Let’s go.  And I did it.  Pushed that little sucker out.  

Now we know how Arianna came into this world.  An unmedicated birth at the hospital under threats of unwanted intervention.  During her childhood and adolescence, Arianna was raised primarily by her mom, Alex, in Manhattan Beach, California, after Alex and Arianna’s dad divorced. 

While Arianna strikes me as serene and mellow, she was a rebellious teenager who experimented a lot during her younger years. 

Arianna:  I wasn’t always so mellow.  Definitely not as a teenager. 

Really?  What happened as a teenage? 

Arianna:  I think I was the teen from hell, especially for my mom.  I had a lot of daddy issues and loved to experiment; was rebellious.  I’m naturally anti-authority, so the whole thing was just a bit of a mess.  But somehow I made it to college. 

You made it through. 

Arianna:  I made it through.  We’re all alive.  It’s fine. 

Is your dad not in your life at all? 

Arianna:  No, he’s not.  I welcome it, if he’d like to be.  I see him maybe once a year at my grandma’s birthdays or for different family events that are on that side, but no.  

Is that still something that comes up for you in terms of issues? 

Arianna:  Not really.  I did think about that for the birth, for Wilder’s birth, my first birth.  It was a question when I transferred to midwife care, which was, hey, do you have any lingering trauma that might come up when you’re giving birth, when you’re in this really vulnerable state, and I thought about that.  It doesn’t trigger me any longer.  It was so long ago, and I think I dealt with the brunt of it through my other relationships and then also going through the relationship with my husband.  All that stuff got worked out.  I was really insecure, a terror.  We had fights.  It was all kinds of stuff that got worked through.  But now when I see him, I’m not triggered at all.  I only have love for him.  If he wanted to have a relationship, I’d be open to it, but really, it’s not my call.  It’s a two-way street. 

Do you see any of him in you? 

Arianna:  I do see some of him.  Facial expressions, and sometimes voices that will come from me or I see in my son, and it’s wild to see.  But it’s not a bad thing.  But I do see it, when I can get a temper.  That’s when he comes out.  So I do feel like I have tempered my temper because it reminds me of him. 

You grew up in Manhattan Beach, and then after nine years old, were you still in Manhattan Beach? 

Arianna:  Yes.  All through high school, Manhattan Beach. 

All through high school.  And then you went from Manhattan to Manhattan? 

Arianna:  I did, yes. 

New York City, here we come. 

Arianna:  Here we come. 

What brought you to New York? 

Arianna:  I fell in love with musical theater randomly.  I loved theater since a young age, maybe eight.  I wanted to be an actor.  I was obsessed with it, thought it was so cool, went to acting camps in the summers at the Santa Monica Playhouse, was just enamored with the whole thing.  My mom worked in the industry.  She worked at Paramount Studios when I was growing up and then owned her own production company, so I grew up around it a lot and thought it was just the most amazing thing.  And what I saw was actors, so that’s naturally what I gravitated toward.  And then I found out that I like to sing, too, and I think it was my junior or senior year that I was like, I want to be in musical theater.  It was a new obsession.  That’s what really brought me to want to be at NYU, and I only wanted to go to NYU and no other college. 

Oh, wow.  Very specific, seeing as how there are so many colleges to go to. 

Arianna:  Very specific.  I said NYU or bust. 

Why NYU?  Was there somebody you knew who went there? 

Arianna:  You know, they asked me this in my interview, which I didn't even know there was going to be an interview when I went to my audition, and I said I fell in love with your website. 

So it is important, what we put on that.

Arianna:  Yeah.  So that was my reason.  I don’t know; I had a calling.  I have no idea why.  I think it was just, to me, the end-all, be-all for whatever reason.  I couldn't find a better alternative for myself. 

Nobody had a better website than NYU?

Arianna:  No, it looked really pretty.  Washington Square Park, just gorgeous. 

Did you pursue singing separate from acting, or was it a combination musical theater only? 

Arianna:  The audition as a combination musical theater only, and I didn't get into that program.  I got into the experimental theater program, which also was very voice-heavy, dance-heavy, body movement-heavy, which I realized was a better fit for me in the end.  All of our teachers did a lot of experimenting and drugs in their youth and perhaps not in their youth.  They had been around the block multiple times.  They had awesome approaches to acting and moving your body and experiencing the world, and it was really an incredible experience.  I wouldn't trade it for anything. 

What is the definition of experimental theater? 

Arianna:  Your guess is as good as mine.  It’s anything and everything from downtown theater to – for example, you could do a senior project at the end, if you chose to, and you could make something.  You could make experimental theater, and one of our graduates made a sport.  So Circle Rules Football.  He made up a sport.  Other people put on full-on productions from, like, gender bending streetcar to just getting naked on stage and painting yourself.  Anything, really. 

That does sound quite experimental. 

Arianna:  Yes. 

Getting back to that original question, you didn't pursue singing as a singer or dance as a dancer?  It was all one big experiment? 

Arianna:  It was all one big thing, and that led me to ultimately, after school, realize that I just liked making art and being a part of making art, and that was it.  It didn't matter in what capacity, way, shape, form.  I liked creating it.  I liked helping other people create it.  Yeah, making other people’s visions come to fruition, coming up with my own visions if I had something to say at any given point.  That’s just – it’s really the nature of experimental theater; it’s very collaborative. 

So you’re an artist that likes to work on a puzzle? 

Arianna:  Yes.  Yeah, that’s great.  Yes. 

I just read that on the NYU website.  No.  So you’re about seven months into your pregnancy, second pregnancy, and we’re just talking a little bit about your very interesting background, growing up in Manhattan Beach, paradise, becoming the daughter of a single mom at nine years old.  Lots of experimentation and testing your mom’s limits through high school, and then going off to NYU to study experimental theater because they had a pretty website. 

Arianna:  Yep. 

But then it sounded at the end that you were saying, like, yes, I like that but – almost like you were saying you like to help other people create their art. 

Arianna:  Yes.  I mean, unless I have something that I’m really passionate about that I want to take a lead on, but I’ll help anyone do anything. It’s just a joyous thing to do, creating art with people and coming up with an immediate community.  It’s almost like growing a family, and then that process ends, and you start over again.  It’s very fun. 

Did your wildness of maturation ever become an almost problem for you? 

Arianna:  Oh, yeah.  Totally.  I mean, I should have died several times, I think. 

From what? 

Arianna:  From just my escapades, the situations I got into.  I did a lot of drugs, had a lot of sex, found myself in really strange places with, I would say – if you’ve ever seen the show Euphoria – it didn't quite go as far as this last season, but it was pretty close. 

Based on a real story, you’re saying? 

So as a teenager, Arianna was recklessly adventurous, but she lived to tell the tale.  Lucky for us, she isn’t shy about sharing the juicy details.  You’re going to want to hear this.  

Arianna’s teen years before motherhood were filled with sex, drugs, and rock and roll.  Life was spinning dangerously out of control.  

So how did you bring yourself out of that?

Arianna:  Going to college, meeting new people and meeting new friends, I just entered a new phase.  And becoming intellectually curious and artistically curious and having somewhere to channel that energy all the time was really helpful.  And feeling like I had a community to share that with instead of having to seek it out, outside of school.  So it was school.  That, I think, really helped a lot. 

It sounds like you had a tremendous amount inside you bursting to come out.

Arianna:  Yes, definitely.  For sure. 

Almost like childbirth.  Okay. 

Arianna:  I was trying to think of a joke, but you got to it first. 

Do you have any regrets?

Arianna:  I have one regret.  It’s from early high school.  My girlfriend asked me to go to a party, and I was too afraid to go.  And I regret that.  And that’s the one regret I have. 

Not what I was expecting. 

Arianna:  No, I know.  Because I made the decision out of fear, and I think that also got me into trouble.  I think that may have been what caused the mayhem was I said no to that because I was afraid, so then I started saying yes to everything, and that’s how I got into my escapades.  But now, I don’t regret any of it. 

Then, you leave New York. 

Arianna:  Yes.  After five years of being there, I came home.  My parents were living in Long Beach at the time – my mom and stepfather.  I call them my parents.  And I was there for six months and helped them move out of their house.  And then I was out to find a job.  I reached out to all these contacts.  I reached out to people I knew through my mom, people I knew from growing up, and they were like, don’t you dare be asking me for a job.  You better just start making stuff, blah, blah, blah.  And I was like, I need to make money to afford to live here and to do that stuff.  It was a pickle, so I ended up working in the service industry for, I think, a year. 

Did that afford you what you needed to get your own place?  

Arianna:  Yeah.  And also then I got to work on projects and start doing film and TV and stuff, but on my own time.

After about a year of waiting tables, Arianna was able to get her own place and even find some time to make art.  Enter best friend Zach from NYU.

Arianna:  My now husband, who was my best friend at the time, he came out to LA.  We were sitting by my parents’ pool, and he said, if you could do anything every single day, what would you do?  And I said, I would write and I would do yoga.  And he said, okay, cool.  I think you can do.  I said, okay.  So we made a pact.  We sat down and wrote each other a promise.  He said, I will write and direct something, and I said, I will help you make it.  And we both signed it.  And within a year, we had made our first short film together. 

Zach: We were very close friends in college.  She introduced me to the world of music festivals and mushrooms and things.  She was very influential in that way in my life.  We’d always remained very close, and then at one point for the first time, we were both single at the same time, and I guess there was underlying tension that I didn't realize was there, and then it just blossomed. 

Arianna:  No, it was not love at first sight.  I walked in, and I thought, aw, man, there are no cute guys here.  He walked in, he was like, oh, that girl’s really cute – talking about my friend – so they dated.  Yeah.  They dated for years, actually.  So I knew I liked him – I think we were sitting in an apartment somewhere, a couple weeks after we had met, and I was staring at him, and he was quietly sitting in a corner.  I was like, man, he’s so thoughtful and weird.  I think I love him.  I called my best friend at the time, and I was like, I love him, but he likes my friend and my friend likes him.  What do I do?  She just told me to bury it.  She said bury it, and I said okay.  So I did, for four or five years. 

That’s crazy because, like, we know what happens when you bury stuff. 

Arianna:  It always comes back, yeah.  Definitely weird and thoughtful.  That was just what drew me to him.  After that, we were just really good friends and eventually best friends.  He came to visit me in LA after I moved and whenever I was in New York, I would hang out with him.  We just went from there, and eventually, in 2014, he came to visit and we were out dancing one night, and we had our first kiss.  And I smelled his beard and told him on the dance floor that I smell my babies on you. 

Zach:  Yes.  She did that one time – not one time, multiple times – say that she could smell her babies on my beard.  We started dating, and it was pretty clear after a year that we were likely going for it, as long as we could keep it together – we’re going for the long haul.  I remember I had dinner with my aunt and Arianna and a couple other people, and after the dinner – we had only been dating for – actually, I don’t think we were dating at the time.  We were just friends.  And my aunt asked me why we weren’t dating yet.  And I said, I don’t know.  We’re just friends.  And she said, yeah, because the moment you date her, you’re going to marry her.  I was like, oh, okay.  If you say so.  Turned out she was correct.  

I always felt very comfortable with her, like I had known her forever.  And I was always dating other people when we were friends.  So it never really crossed my mind that – I guess, no, that’s not true.  It did.  But I tried to not have it cross my mind.  I would say I always knew we were going to be very close.  And then when we were both single and started dating, it became clear that I couldn't live without here. 

Arianna:  Three years later, we were engaged.  And then eight months after that, we were married. 

After love and marriage, Arianna and Zach pursued the proverbial baby carriage. 

Arianna:  Growing up in his family was really fun.  He’s one of five, and his family’s awesome.  He loves having a ton of siblings, and his parents are still together and they’re great, so he had a wonderful experience with that.  So I think he always wanted a lot of kids.  My dad’s side of the family is huge, and I always liked that energy, and I always wanted to continue that.  I didn't get the opportunity to grow up with siblings, so I thought, how fun would it be if we created that for ourselves?  But the whole like, okay, this mental shift of, we’re really ready to start a family now – we both mentally shifted, and it immediately happened. 

Their journey continues in One Way or a Mother, Episode 2. 

Arianna:  I had so much pain in my body, in my legs and glutes and back area, the entire time.  It was just excruciating.  It would keep me up at night; it would wake me up at night.  I was used to being woken up by my body in pain and having to sort of manage it and try to go back to sleep.  So I didn't think anything of it.  

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