My Experience Giving Birth Naturally vs. Epidural Q&A

There's the star of the show. We had to take a little halsey break. He was crying. He needed someone to come rescue him from his nap. He's gonna get so hang on for holding him back. You better hold him right. Wait, you think that's bad? Yeah. He likes a little stretch. What's up guys? Natan Sutton back with another video and it's been a minute and it's been... Can you believe this woman right here is two weeks post birth? This is the first I've looked alive in two weeks too. I did my makeup and everything. So today we are doing a little Q&A. What day is today? Today is Sutton's Q&A because you're the one that's gonna be answering all the questions. I'm excited about this video because I think it's gonna be really easy. Yeah, we're going for the easy videos nowadays because... Not much time. Yeah, at least for now until we get the hang of things. Having these two little guys running around. We did a story time of Oakland's birth like way after we had him. So everything was such a blur. But I'm glad we're doing this so close to when I had Halston because I remember everything. Alright, so let's hop into it. Let's see what people are asking you. Y'all submitted so many questions. I was like, I don't think we're gonna get like that many questions for this kind of video. And if they'll ask me last night, he's like, so how are the questions looking? And it was like, you couldn't even, I don't even know how many there are. There's so many. Oh man. Alright, let's get started here. Would you choose one over the other? Yes. So just as a quick little, I'm not sure how obvious this is gonna be, but we're interviewing Sutton on the difference between having a natural birth versus a birth with an epidural. Because she has done both. Not many people have. Not by choice. It came upon me. Yeah, so you would choose one over the other? Yes, I would choose the epidural. And first of all, before we even start this video, let's just get this out there that everyone's experience is different. Everyone's pain level is different. I don't want you guys, yeah, I don't want you guys watching our video and being like, oh, I'm scared to ever have kids. I don't want to go through that because just because I had this horrific pain does not at all mean that's what's gonna happen to you. Our doctor told us that the faster labor comes on, the more painful it is. And I had the entire experience within an hour. And when we got to the hospital, my water, I mean I had him within 15 minutes of being in the hospital, so that's like on the fast track if I've ever heard it. So I think the pain I was experiencing was like a different level of pain. My friend has had a natural birth and she said it was just like an ow, ow, ow kind of pain. But I, that was not my experience. As you can hear. Yeah. From our previous video. So I would choose, yeah, to answer the question, I would choose an epidural. And I have reasons. I'll tell you the main, the main reason is because, so without the pain, I felt like I was able to be more present. It was just a more enjoyable experience. Like I wasn't in this horrific pain. And that's all I could think about. Like with Halston, all I could think about was how bad this hurts. And like some of the questions I saw was who were saying when they lay him on your chest, does the pain go away? And for me, no, it did not. Like all I was still thinking about was like how bad I'm hurting and I couldn't enjoy like looking at him because I couldn't think about anything else. Yeah. And as a husband, I prefer the epidural as well. Although, yeah, my experience overall, but I will say I'm not getting interviewed. Nevermind. No one cares what you think. What do you believe God revealed to you during the process of natural birth? It was a very quick process, but I would say probably the biggest thing that was revealed to me is that I could do it. Like I would, even in the video, I'm saying I can't do it. I can't do it. And before ever having him, I said like, I can't not have an epidural. So I guess he was showing me that, yes, I can do it. Is it fun? No, but you can do it. That's one thing I was telling Sutton is I think that she underestimates herself a lot. And I felt like this was a great opportunity to show her that she's capable of more than she thinks. Will your next birthing experience be natural or will you get an epidural? I'm getting an epidural and I'm camping out in the hospital parking lot to be there on time. Because for those of you that don't know, that's the whole reason she couldn't have an epidural is because we got there too late. And within 15 minutes of us getting there, Halston came out. But it was not too late on our fault. Like it's not like we were lollygagging around. Everyone told me from the beginning, don't come to the hospital until your contractions hurt. So we were going off of that because y'all saw our video about the false alarm. Those contractions didn't hurt. So I was like, okay, well then we'll just wait until they do. And so I had two contractions that hurt and we walked out the door and got in the car. It's like we could not have gotten there any faster. I don't think someone asked what, how bad does the epidural hurt? Oh, it doesn't hurt at all. Like I feel like you're already, at least for me with Oakland, I was already in pain, like from the contractions that when they're giving you the epidural, it's like, you know, this thing is about to give you such relief that you're just like do whatever you want. I don't care. And I didn't even, I mean, you don't even feel it. It's just like, ah, relief is coming. Compare the recovery. Oh, this was a very common question that I think was a good one. Okay. First of all, with Oakland, I had y'all, if you've been watching us for a while, you know that I had like really bad back pain and really bad tailbone pain before having him. Like when I was pregnant, I had that pain. And a lot of people say like, oh, the epidural causes back pain. I don't know that to be true because my back was already hurting like so bad that I'm not going to blame the epidural for my back pain. So I will say the recovery this time around was a lot better, but with Halston's pregnancy, I didn't have tailbone pain and I didn't have back pain during my pregnancy because I was doing physical therapy. So it makes it sound like the epidural may have done it, but I don't believe that it did because those things were already hurting. And also with Oakland, I had the tailbone and back pain and the beds in the hospital are so uncomfortable. And when I got the epidural, I couldn't feel all the pain I was having. And I even told him, I was like, man, this is so nice. Like I'm sitting up. Can you believe I'm sitting up? This feels so good. And then afterwards, boy, did I feel the fact that I had been sitting up without feeling it. So this time the recovery has been better, but I'm not going to put the blame on the epidural for my recovery being harder the first time because I just don't know that to be true. Can you try to describe the pain you went through? Oh, there's really not words. Like I don't know that there's something that would hurt worse than that to me. How has being a family of four affected your marriage and relationship with Nate? I had to throw myself in there. Did you make that up? No, it's right there. Well, we're only two weeks in and I just feel like this time is very consuming with a baby. One of his friends actually gave him that advice before we had Oakland. He's like, be prepared that she is going to be all about the baby and not about you. You just got to suck it up and be supportive. And I feel like that's kind of happening again. It's just so demanding that you really, sadly, we don't have much time together, but it's just a short amount of time. It's going to be over before we know it, right? We'll see. Oh, someone asked a question that I saw earlier that I don't know if you're going to find it, so I'm going to answer it. They asked, did I tear the first time and the second time and could I feel it? So the answer is yes, tore both times. First degree tear, which is supposedly the best kind that you can have, not so bad. And yes, you could feel it, felt it happen. Do you feel empowered by your body or traumatized by the pain or somewhere in between? I definitely feel good about it. I kind of did something that I never thought I could do and never wanted to do and I did it. So that feels good. I don't feel traumatized. It's not like I'm like thinking back on it like, oh, that was so horrible. Which one seems more emotional when it comes to the memory of those moments? I know your answer. Yeah, for me, this was so much more emotional than with Oakland. I remember, I don't even know if I cried with Oakland, maybe a little bit, but this one, I was just like a mess because I think it was directly correlated with the pain she was experiencing. To see her in that much pain just took me to over the edge. Yeah, I would say the same thing. It was definitely more emotional, but Oakland, it was just a weird scenario of like we were sleeping kind of and they come in the barge in the doors and like, all right, let's go, time to flush. It was just weird. But with this one, there was like so much build up to it. I'd been awake for so long, like in the middle of the night. And yeah, it was this one was more emotional. What was the reason the nurses and doctors gave for not enabling an epidural? Oh, they said it's too late, is what they said. Yeah. She said it would be like any minute now because I think I was like nine and three-fourths dilated or something. And she actually, it missed this part in the video, but she was like, I'm going to go get the test for the virus or whatever. She leaves the room and like literally within a minute, I was telling him, I was like, he's coming out right now like get her to come back in here. And so he stuck his head out the door and was like yelling, like someone come in here. We're in the triage room, like the room that you go to when you first get to the hospital. We weren't even in like a hospital room, like where you have a baby. Yeah. I was confused. I think she was a little confused too. She acted like, she's like, it's coming up. And I'm like, yeah, I'm like, you're going to throw up. Okay. Let me get, and I was running to get a trash can. And she's like, no, he's coming out. And I'm like, oh, so I ran out I wish that part would have been on the video. That was pretty funny. Not at the moment, but it is now. Oh yeah. Basically. And I think they said that the epidural would have taken like 30 minutes for you to even feel it. Right. Something like that. And you have to get tested to do it, like test your blood or something. I'm not sure, but anyway, they basically met it, made it sound like she just didn't have time. And I didn't. Hi, I was wondering why is the belly still big even after birth? Oh my gosh. His brother said this to me after at Oakland, he came in the hospital room the next day and he's like, why are you still pregnant? They're babies right here. I always thought that was weird too. I thought your stomach just was like flat right after you get birth. No, you, I mean, you have so much water weight to lose and everything and all your organs got to move back in place. And it just takes time. I've heard people say that it takes you nine months to get that way, like to get that pregnant. So give yourself nine months to get back, which I think is very fair. How did you feel seeing Nathaniel worried, crying for you to put myself in here somehow? I'll tell you in the moment, I didn't even notice. I didn't know he was filming. I didn't, I feel like I didn't hear anything, like whatever the nurse was telling me to do. I didn't know he was crying. You didn't? No. I feel like I had my eyes closed like the majority of the time, but I just felt like I couldn't listen to anything. Like it was just so crazy. But watching the video back, maybe, I definitely cried watching our video, probably more for him than me. And someone else asked, I thought this was a good question. Did the, did they numb me to sew me up? And they did. They put something in my arm that was supposed to make me feel like I'd had a couple alcoholic drinks, they said. And they did it once and I didn't feel anything. And she's like starting to give me the numbing shots there. And I was like, just so you know, I don't feel dizzy or anything. And so they gave me like another thing in my arm and then she was giving me the shots. And honestly, they could have literally done anything to me. And I'm like, it does not hurt. Like you can do whatever you want. It doesn't hurt. Because nothing compared to the pain I just had. So like getting the shots, no big deal. Sewn up, no big deal. Needles in my arm, didn't care. There's the star of the show. We had to take a little Halsey break. He was crying. He needed someone to come rescue him from his nap. He's gonna get so hate on for holding him bad. You gotta hold him right. Wait, you think that's bad? Yeah. He likes a little stretch. Okay, it seems to be a common question of feeling like drugged with the epidural. And I'll tell you that you don't feel that. Like I felt numb from the waist down, but I didn't feel like dizzy or anything going on in my head. Ask Halston a question. Who's the cutest guy in the world? This is his first couch video debut. He likes the mic. How do you feel? How do you feel about so many people seeing your lady bits? Lady bits. That's definitely a weird thing. For some reason it's not that weird having the baby because you have so much other things going on, but all the appointments before that, doing those things, it's not very fun. Did you have a midwife deliver or a doctor? It was a midwife. Did you keep your placenta or take a photo? No. But she did show it to us and it was huge. That was something that I really liked about this hospital was she was, it was so nice that they were informing us on what the heck was going on. With Oakland's experience, I didn't know what was going on or what they were doing, but she was so nice and she would tell us, okay, his cord is done pumping all the blood. This is the color. It turns when it's done and now we can cut it. She let him cut it and then she showed us the placenta and pulled it out and showed us the anatomy of it. She said she was trying to get Halston out while he was still in the water sack. Yeah. I didn't know that was a thing. I thought your water had to break before you have your baby, but that's not true. He was about to come out in his water and then it burst in the last second and went everywhere. A common question also was did we try any different positions or did they suggest anything, but I don't know if the video shows it right, but there was no time for anything. There was no time to talk. There was no time to move. It was just like, you're in the bed. She leaves to go get the COVID-19 test and then within a minute we're like yelling for her to come back in there and she's like putting on her mask and her gown and stuff and he was out like it was just there was no time to try anything else. All right guys, well it's time for little Halston to eat, but you heard it from here first. And once again, I'll put the disclaimer at the end too. Everyone's pain is different. Everyone's experience is different. Don't take my experience to be yours. It will be different, so don't be scared, but in the meantime also we're probably going to create a new intro video and I'm trying to think would you guys rather see like random fun clips of our lives like we kind of have in our current intro or would you like to see like uh and like how do I say it like a one location shoot if that makes sense. I know my vote. What? The first one. Oh really? Why? It's just more entertaining. It's fun like seeing different stuff than all the same stuff. All right, let's close it out Halston. This is Nate. He's about to cry. This is Nate and Sutton and Halston sowing seeds of truth, love, and babies one view at a time. Oh and that was what is it the natural birth? Yeah. Okay, let's do it again. You just do it. And that was the natural birth Q&A.