The fabulous Katie Freeman with her son Sebastian (2) and daughter Keating (10 months). Katie and her husband were able to conceive Sebastian just as they'd decided to start trying and she went on to have a very healthy and enjoyable pregnancy. She carried to 42 weeks when her midwife decided it was time to induce. The induction went well but after 14 hours on Pitocin, it was time for an epidural. The epidural allowed her to get some rest and she pushed without it for quite some time before she felt done. The midwife mentioned needing to go get the doctor and Katie asked for her to give her just a minute. The epidural had been turned off so she felt everything and let out a primal scream, but she got her baby out. Katie says the transition to motherhood was amazing and she cried every day the first few weeks because she was so incredibly happy.
When Sebastian was about 8 months old, Katie had just run a relay marathon, their lives were generally busy and in flux but she remembers telling her nanny she was so tired, the last time she'd been so tired was when she was pregnant. She didn't think anything more of it until she threw up one morning and a positive pregnancy test soon followed. Katie cried, when she found out, not because she didn't want another child but because she didn't feel prepared. She had always been a planner and this wasn't the timing she'd imagined. Her pregnancy went well, though she says she does feel she wasn't able to enjoy it much.
Her labor and delivery with Keating were very different than her first experience. At 41 weeks she went into labor on her own and progressed without intervention while she labored in the water. She only had to push three times and says that it was "downright orgasmic". Her birth was beautiful but she knew while laboring that Keating has passed meconium and the NICU team was standing by. Her baby was whisked away and suctioned. The team told her they had never seen a baby ingest so much meconium. Katie overheard worry that Keating wasn't pinking up and shouted out that her husband was pale! They realized that Keating's lips had regained color but she was indeed just quite pale.
Transitioning from mom of one to two has been amazing and amazingly chaotic but Katie says she couldn't love it any more. She's recently transitioned to staying at home and while she finds that space when she needs some me time, wouldn't have it any other way.
Katie struggled with her body image for much of her life. She developed early and while her mother was very positive and supportive she didn't feel comfortable in her skin for quite some time. She says she was so innocent, the girl that believed in Santa Claus until she was twelve, and having hips and breasts just felt uncomfortable in comparison. Her mother always told her that she would grow into her body some day and it wasn't until adulthood that she realized how amazing it was.
Positive body image is something that Katie believes deeply in and she feels it's amazingly important to cultivate the fact that it begins on an emotional level. If you can't learn to love yourself separately of your external appearance, you will never be happy with any external shifts or changes your body undergoes. Katie hopes to continue to support this personally and cultivate the same notions with her children.