How to Build Confidence for Birth (and Trust Your Body) with Sivan Dirks

In this episode, Dr. Emily Spaeth sits down with Sivan Dirks, an acupuncturist, herbalist, and birth doula who specializes in prenatal, postpartum, and pediatric care. Sivan is the director of Wise Mama Collective and runs her own acupuncture practice, Rose City Baby.Sivan path into birth work started organically. Clients kept asking her to be at their births long before she was trained as a doula. Through her own three pregnancies, including a cesarean birth and a VBAC, she developed a deep understanding of what actually builds confidence in labor: not blind trust, but real knowledge of how the nervous system works.In this conversation, Emily and Sivan talk about:Why "just trust your body" isn't enough on its own, and what real confidence is built on insteadHow the nervous system acts as a "doorway" to birth, and why interrupting it is so much easier than supporting itThe difference between sympathetic and parasympathetic states, and why birth is fundamentally a deactivating processA simple breathing tool you can use right now to create more choice and calm in stressful momentsWhy every provider interaction that leaves you scared or anxious is a communication failure, not a reflection of youHow to start reconnecting with your own inner wisdom, even outside of pregnancyOne of the most powerful moments in the episode: Sivan shares a quote that's stuck with her for years — between stimulus and response, there is space, and in that space, we have choice, and in that choice, we have freedom. She unpacks what that means physiologically and how it applies directly to labor, parenting, and everyday life.Connect with Sivan: Wise Mama Collective - https://www.wisemamacollective.com/Resources mentioned:Be Well Baby - www.bewellbaby.org Oura Ring (Emily's sleep and recovery tracker) - https://ouraring.com/raf/aeac336b38?utm_source=user&utm_medium=iac_raf&utm_type=alwayson-cvr&utm_campaign=2026RAF&utm_variant=2026_raf_dec