Pregnancy, Birth, and Trusting Your Body

Dr. Lona and Dr. Alice Kephart on why fear is not a place to birth from, and what
it means to actually trust your body

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I’ve known Dr. Alice since 2013. We’ve walked through pregnancies together, hers and mine, long before she ever joined this practice. So when we sat down for this Doc Talk, it didn’t feel like an interview. It felt like the conversation we’d have anyway.

Between the two of us, we’ve got four kids. Alice has a four-year-old and a one-and-a-half-year-old. I’ve got Jack, who’s 11, and Max, who’s 6. Every one of those pregnancies and births taught us something we didn’t know going in.

When should you start chiropractic care during pregnancy?

Now. That’s always our answer. But most women don’t find their way to us until something’s already uncomfortable.

Alice saw this constantly in her own practice. Sciatica. Low back pain, especially in the third trimester, when the pelvis and ribs are expanding faster than you can keep up with. And often, right around that 34 to 36 week ultrasound, if the baby is found in a breech position, that’s what finally brings someone through the door. But we’d love to see you from the start, even when you’re planning to become pregnant.

There’s another group we’re seeing more of, women who didn’t love their first birth and want something different this time. They come in asking what they can do differently, and that shift, from reacting to being proactive, is one of the best things we get to witness.

And sometimes it’s a practice member we’ve already been caring for who tells us they’re pregnant. That’s the version we love most, because their spine and nervous system are already supported before their body starts asking for it.

Why is fear not a place to birth from?

Somewhere along the way, birth got heavily medicalized, and a lot of the messaging women receive, even well-meaning messaging, plants fear instead of confidence. And fear is not a place to birth from.

I don’t believe my body is going to create a baby that wasn’t meant to be birthed through it. There’s an intelligence running the whole process. I remember going through labor myself and feeling this shift, from my rational mind into something more animal, more innate. The more I tried to think my way through it, logically, the more I worked against myself. Alice knows that shift, too. It’s not something you can force. You surrender to it.

How do you find a birth team you can actually trust?

This might be the biggest piece. It’s not just about a birth plan. It’s about who’s going to educate you, listen to you, and let you say yes or no to what’s offered.

If you keep hitting roadblock after roadblock trying to establish care somewhere, that’s information. Maybe that’s a sign this isn’t the right team for you, in this season. With my own midwife, I never got told what I had to do. She’d ask a question, and then wait for my answer. That’s how I learned there’s no actual due date, just a window, wide, the same way we don’t all wear the same size shoe. It’s also how I ended up choosing almost nothing traditional medical in either of my two home births. She’d ask, “Is this test going to change anything about what you’d do?” And half the time I realized, no, I think I’d just have more fear if I did it. Informed consent means you’re allowed to decline. She was the right fit for me because she let me find that out for myself.

Alice found her own version of that same freedom. In her second pregnancy, she chose never to step on a scale, because she knew what those weight checks would do to her mental health versus what they’d actually change about her care. Most of what’s offered during pregnancy is a choice. It just doesn’t always get presented that way.

What does trusting your body actually look like?

It looks like knowing you have options and asking questions until you understand them. Some women feel safest birthing in a hospital, and that’s exactly right for them. Some feel safest at home, and that’s exactly right, too.

It also comes down to who’s in the room and how soon people come in after birth. All of it feeds back into whether your nervous system feels safe enough to let your body do what it already knows how to do. That’s where our best outcomes come from.

An empowered birth tends to lead to an empowered postpartum. Confidence doesn’t disappear once the baby arrives, either. It carries into breastfeeding, into knowing when something feels off and asking about it, into trusting yourself even without every answer yet.

Do you need a village or a peer support group?

They’re not the same thing, and we suggest you have both if at all possible. A peer group is the women going through it alongside you right now, comparing notes on clogged milk ducts and sleepless nights. A village is different. It’s the women who’ve already been through it who can steward you instead of just relating to you, and who you’ll one day pass that same knowledge on to.

How does chiropractic care support Mom and Baby through this?

Baby’s nervous system, and yours, are being shaped by how supported your spine is through pregnancy, labor, and postpartum. A body with a clear nervous system adapts better to every shift pregnancy asks of it, and it sets the baby up for a pelvis in a place of ease, ready for the hormonal changes and ligament shifts labor requires.

We can’t hand you a due date. Nobody can. What we can do is help your body carry this season with less interference, so when it’s time to trust your body, that trust has something real to stand on.