Virginia Focus - PUSH for Empowered Pregnancy

Stillbirth affects about 1 in every 175 births, and each year about 21,000 babies are stillborn in the United States, according to the CDC. This is the equivalent of a school bus full of children every day. On this episode, we're learning more about the issue by talking with Executive Director Samantha Banerjee who runs the nonprofit PUSH for Empowered Pregnancy. Katie Gray will be filling in this week as the host. We begin this episode hearing the experience that lead Banerjee to advocate for awareness.

Episode Transcript

(00:06):
Welcome to Virginia Focus. I'm RebeccaHughes of the Virginia News Network. Still
Births of fact, about one inevery one hundred and seventy five berths in
each year, about twenty one thousandbabies are still born in the United States.
According to the CDC. This isthe equivalent of a school bus full
of children every day. On thisepisode, we're learning more about the issue
by talking with the executive director,Samantha Banerjee, who runs the nonprofit Push

(00:31):
for Empowered Pregnancy. Katie Gray willbe filling in this week as the host.
We begin the episode hearing the experiencethat led Banerjee to advocate for awareness.
Yeah. So, unfortunately, Icame to the stillbirth world for the
worst possible reason. Two days beforemy due date in twenty thirteen, I

(00:51):
was pregnant with my daughter Alana.She was our first child, first grandchild
on both sides of the family,highly anticipated. Everything about her pregnancy had
been perfect. I was, youknow, young, healthy. I was
told the whole time that it wastextbook until I walked into the hospital and
labor thinking we were finally bringing homeork baby girl after nine long, healthy,

(01:15):
blissful months, only to be toldshe no longer had a heartbeat.
We were completely blindsided. We hadno idea that this still happened to anyone
in this day and age, letalone to us who had every privilege at
our advantage in our pregnancy. Andyeah, we were shocked and horrified.

(01:38):
We you know, went in.They had put the monitor on me and
and just silence, and eventually theymoved me over to the to the ultrasound
machine and that's when they said,I'm sorry, she has no heartbeat.
And you know, my husband,I'll never forget the sound of his his

(02:00):
voice breaking and him screaming no overmy shoulder as he realized that I actually
still needed to go through labor,that our daughter she was full term.
I mean, it's two days beforeher due date. She was six and
a half pounds. I had togive birth to her. And I think
that's another big misconception about still birth, is that people tend to assume that

(02:23):
it's like a miscarriage or something,which miscarriage is horrible and traumatic too,
but it does not typically involve havingIt does not, my definition, involve
giving birth to a you know,baby that is several pounds and you know
twenty four hours later, I walkedout of the hospital empty handed. We

(02:46):
got back in the car, hedrove home with her brand new car seat
rattling in the back. Pulled intomy house, where her fully decorated nursery,
you know, had a drying rackof brand new baby waiting for her
newborn photos in the living room.It was like stepping back into you know,

(03:08):
like the the upside down. Right. Our entire worlds were just turned
over, and it was so surrealthat are you know, we had planned
for an entire year, our entirelives around this child who was no longer
here. Well, I mean,and even what you mentioned, it's already
hard enough to believe of a stillbirth, right like, to go through

(03:32):
that, but then on top ofthat, also that far along, because
I you know, I feel likeI'm probably not alone that there may be
a lot of people that have somemisconceptions that you know, there was some
indications that it was a complicated pregnancyor you kind of knew before that,

(03:53):
but you're saying that everything was normalup until two days before. Yeah,
And that's one of the and that'sone of the big misconceptions about still birth
is that you know, most peopletend to assume it's happening to uh all.
Like I've literally had people say tome as when I tell them home,
I'm the executive director of a silverBorth branch and nonprofit. Oh but

(04:14):
those babies are all very sick,and it's like no, no, Unfortunately
they are not the vast majority ofstillbirds. Eighty percent of so birth moms
have no known maternal risk factors atthe start of the pregnancy. So the
vast majority of silbirds are happening inpregnancies where that are otherwise you know,
healthy and low and considered low risklike mine. There's a lot of a

(04:38):
lot of babies like my daughter whoare just falling through the cracks. And
yes, there are some signs andsymptoms which I would love to share more
about. But the problem is thatour medical system is not educating parents on
this. When parents bring concerns,they're often being dismissed, and we are

(04:58):
not making it a priority to catchthese babies who are quietly vulnerable and struggling,
and we just you know, don'tknow about it because we're assuming like
everybody else, that you know,once you're past the you know that twelve
week work in the third the firsttrimester that you're in the safe zone,
but that it's simply it's it's alie that we're telling to parents. There

(05:18):
is no safe zone in pregnancy.And in my case, you know,
because my pregnancy had been going sowell, I never even had a detailed
ultrasound until after the twenty week anatomyskin that's halfway through. I went four
months without another ultrasound, and thatis not uncommon in this country. Yeah,

(05:44):
and it's really, honestly, it'sit's it's criminal. We are not
treating every pregnancy like a life tolose. And the thing that was so
infuriating to me was that when Iwent on, you know, it's lucky
enough to get pregnant again within sixmonths. You know, my my son
was born two weeks after what shouldhave been my daughter's first birthday. I

(06:05):
had another pregnancy a few years laterwith another daughter, and thankfully both those
pregnancies were fine, but since Iwas at that point now because I had
had a loss, was considered highrisk. The care that I received was
worlds away from what I had gottenin my first pregnancy, and I walked

(06:30):
out of those pregnancies thinking why didI have to pay for this with my
child's life. You know, everybaby, every baby counts, every every
baby deserves the best possible chance toget here safe. Not every pregnant,
not every silverth can be prevented.You know, accidents happen, but research
shows that at least one in fourUS silbirds, including forty seven percent at

(06:56):
term, those are any like mydaughter's, you know, thirty seven a
week or older, can be preventedright now using the tools UH and technologies
that we have. It's just thatwe're not making a consistent effort to do
so. And you know, peoplejust don't realize the big picture. Even
even Obe's you know, the averageobecs one or two Silberts a year,

(07:17):
and they're they're kind of taught like, oh, this is just a terrible
thing that happens. There's nothing youcan do about it. But it's simply
not true. You know, ifyou look at the the UH what's going
on in other countries, places likethe UK and Australia have implemented UH bundles

(07:38):
of protocols that are really simple,straightforward things, things like educating parents on
fetal on fetal movement, you know, checking regular routine leaning the third trimester
for fetal growth restriction, which isreally closely tied to stillbirth, you know,
teaching moms to sleep on their sidein the third trimester. There have

(07:59):
been five five studies of increasing sizeand rigor internationally showing a clear link between
sleeping on your back and the thirdtrimester and full term still birth. And
simply falling asleep on your side couldbe enough to give a daughter, a
baby like my daughter, who isagain quietly struggling, you know, enough

(08:24):
of a boost to make it through. But unfortunately, still birth, you
know, and many times is justa It is a perfect storm of different
factors, none of which on theirown would cause a loss, but they're
combining in such a way that youknow, it just it's just a really
unfortunate situation. But the most unfortunatepart about it is that we are not

(08:50):
even giving parents the chance to reducethose risks. You know, we educate,
We educate parents all the time rightabout the other dangers to your child
life. You hear NonStop prematurity,CIDs, car accidents, drowning, guns,
fire, poison, flu, listeria. You know, none of us
can eat a sandwich in peace throughpregnancy, because we all know that.

(09:15):
You know, your deli meat couldhave listeria in it. Meanwhile, stillbirth
is claiming more children's lives in theUS up to age fourteen than all of
those things I just mentioned combined.Every year, we lose over twenty thousand
children to stillbirth. That's about sixtyfive a day. That's a school bus

(09:39):
full or three kindergarten classes every singleday of children are being born still in
the United States. And we knowat minimum twenty five percent of those are
preventable. If we matched the ratesof our best international peers, we can
be preventing up to seventy five percentof US sobers. So it's really just

(10:01):
it's unacceptable what is going on.And unfortunately you never hear about it unless
it's happened to you or someone youlove, and you know, and unlike
all those other you know, commondangers to children, we are not giving
parents the chance to lower their risk. You know, just like all those

(10:22):
other things. You know, accidentshappen. You can't always reduce, you
know, prevent everything, but youcan do things, you know, we
are taught make sure your kids ina car seat, you know this,
keep them away from a pool,you know, lock up the poisons that
are under your sink, like andso parents are totally sink. They're giving
the opportunity and they're able to significantlylower their risk. And it's the same

(10:46):
exact thing when it comes to stowbirth, except that you wait, you
don't find out until after it's alreadytoo late, all the things that you
could have done differently. And thething that's most horrific about that is it
just leaves parents like me with alifetime of guilt and regret and excitating what
ifs, because you know, Iwill never I will never stop wondering if

(11:07):
I'd only known to go to sleepon my side those last two weeks of
her pregnancy, when her movement hadslowed down, if I had, you
know, known when I brought upto my doctors that her movement had changed,
and they they came back at mewith the old wives tales that,

(11:28):
oh, babies slow down at theend of pregnancy because they're running out of
room or they're just saving it forbirth. If I had known to push
back on that, if I hada detailed ulder sound that showed that she'd
fallen off her growth curve, thoselast couple of weeks of the pregnancies.
You know, any of those thingscould have been a red flag, should
have been a red flag that triggeredsomething in me and my provider and my

(11:54):
providers to say, we need totake a closer look at this baby and
see what's going on and pretendly deliverher earlier. Because you know, both
of my subsequent kids were had electiveinductions at thirty seven and a half weeks,
which is the exact time when Alanastarted having issues, and they were
totally fine. No nick usays,you know, ten out of ten atars,

(12:18):
and there was no reason that Alanashould not be alive today if our
system was set up to do whatit should do. And so I don't
blame my providers, and it tooka very long time, but I don't
blame myself either anymore, because asI met more parents who'd been through this,

(12:39):
it just became you know, ifthousands of parents are making the same
quote unquote mistakes every year, clearlythat's a systemic issue. Right. That's
not the failure of any one parentto do something. It's not like,
you know, and again it's notlike I was an ignorant pregnant person like
I actively sought out information throughout myentire pregnant and see and even despite that,

(13:03):
I was never educated about stillbirth orany of these risks or how to
lower them. In a nutshell,how I ended up as a still birth
advocate and starting push for empowered pregnancy. You know, we basically got together.
We just celebrated at our anniversary anda bunch of us parents from across
the country got together a few yearsago and we're like, we can't We're

(13:30):
pissed. I can't continue to sithere and watch this happen to another sixty
five families every single day in thiscountry and no one's doing anything about it.
You know, we just, youknow, there was there's other organizations
out there who have fantastic tools,and you know, been trying to advocate
for a long time. But ourmedical system is tough. You know,

(13:54):
it's very paternalistic. It doesn't wantto hear from anybody who's not an MD
about how they should be doing theirjobs. You know, this is just
the culture and the way that it'salways been. And so a lot of
many advocates have been has been toRoffle Feathers and when we started pushing.

(14:15):
We said, you know what,we don't care. We have nothing left
to lose. Now, We've alreadyburied our children, and we need to
make sure that this is not goingto happen to any other families. You
know, our our our kids mayhave been born into silence, but we're
going to do whatever it takes tomake sure their voices are heard. And
so that's how we've approached it sincewe since we launched, you know,
we are just making noise anywhere wecan to get the attention of anyone with

(14:41):
the power to change things. Andso we've done things like you know,
we hosted a march on the NationalMall in DC. We did an awareness
an awareness walk in New York Citywhere we carried nine hundred onesies on our
backs. That's the number of babiesborn still in the US. I mean,
I'm in the US in New YorkCity every year, and that's nine

(15:05):
hundred one is strung up on aclose line stretch two and a half city
blocks. So we marched those downfrom Central Park down to City Hall four
and a half miles. We madeit through eighty street crossings in Manhattan without
getting run over, and to raiseawareness of what was going on. And
again, the comments that we gotin the street were just eye opening because

(15:28):
people would say things back to uslike, oh, stillbirth, I thought
that was from the Middle Ages,Or oh that's really sad, but that
only happens to poor people, right, or this is my favorite, what
did the momb do wrong? Andso, you know, it was just

(15:50):
very reflective. I mean, webelieved all those things too until it happened
to us. And so that's whyI think our message has been resonating.
You know, we've been going obviouslytop down, systemic change is desperately needed,
but it takes time, and wedon't have time with this many lives
on the line every single day,and so we've simultaneously been going grassroots out
to parents to be like, hey, look, I'm just like you.

(16:15):
If this happened to me, itcan happen to you too. And unfortunately,
what we see in the United Statesis that anyone the less you look
like me, the more likely itis to happen to you. Because anybody
from a marginalized background, anyone whois a woman of color, particularly black
and indigenous parents, immigrants, LGBTQfamilies, basically the further you are from

(16:41):
a you know, a privileged whitesuburban woman, the more likely you are
for your concerns to be dismissed inour medical system due to systemic racism,
implicit bias, and also just thedifficulty of access and care due to social
determinants of health depending on the communitythat you live in. And so yeah,

(17:03):
I mean parents thankfully have been listening. They're you know, they're hearing
what we have to say. Ourour social media reach has been has been
shockingly huge since we launched, andgrowing really really quickly. We were really
lucky. Uh. This just acouple of weeks ago. Actually we launched
with Earth Mama Organics. It wasan absolutely wonderful company who has been you

(17:27):
know, prioritizing the safety of momsand babies, especially during pregnancy, uh,
for for decades. You know.They'd heard about what we were doing,
and they joined up thus to createa public service announcement AD to raise
awareness about stillbirth. And so wejust launched that through all of our social

(17:47):
media channels on May first, forWomen's Health Month. And so yeah,
there's just we have so many differentthings going on, uh, and we
are you know, actively advocating withthe federal government with there's a couple of
bills in Congress that some of ourpartners launched to try to improve still Worth

(18:08):
data collection and education and make surethat federal funding is available to states who
want to do so Worth prevention programsbecause there is stuff out there, and
again, many states don't realize thatthis is something they cann't even use their
funding on. And you know,we're talking to the NIH who has a

(18:29):
for the first time in I thinka decade as still Worth working group,
specifically with a committee dedicated to prevention. We advocated very hard for that because
the first the first time they mentionedthey launched the group in twenty twenty two,
prevention was not part of their mandateand we as parents, there's just
huge outcry amongst our community, whichour team helped coordinate in a way that

(18:55):
would be effective to get the messagethrough to leaders in all of our major
public health agencies to say, hey, we need to we need to broaden
the scope of this and really makeprevention a priority, because we're all sitting
here telling you that our baby's deathswere potentially preventable and that it's continuing to
happen to three kindergarten classes worth ofchildren every single day, and we need

(19:21):
to do better and we're not goingto accept anything less. There's a couple
of things I really want to unpacka little bit, a little bit further
in our time. You did mentionthat one of the pieces that your organization
is setting out for is a reallybig piece on education. How is your
organization, you know, addressing thatneed. Yeah, so there is such

(19:45):
a huge need for education, bothamongst providers and amongst patients. So obviously,
as parents, we're just going directlythrough whatever outlets we can get through
social media, news that lie,it's radio, and just to tell people,
hey, soberth still happens. Itcan happen even in healthy lowers pregnancy.

(20:07):
But you shouldn't be scared. Youshould feel empowered because there are if
now that you know this, thereare things you can do to significantly lower
your risk. And so we alwaysinvite people to come to our website push
pregnancy dot org, where we havean absolute ton of research based information leaking
directly back to the sources so youcan investigate for yourself. It's basically,
you know, all the information thatwe as parents wish somebody had told us

(20:30):
because it might have made a differencein our outcomes simultaneously, Again, we
need top down change, so weare going directly to providers with training.
We're working right now on a soilWorth's prevention training. But actually the first
thing we launched was a Pregnancy afterLoss provider training because obviously the experience of

(20:55):
going through a pregnancy again after havinga prior soberth or other traumatic loss is
incredibly harrowing and we really need differentthings as patients. And unfortunately, the
data shows that moms who've had astill worth are almost five times as likely
to have another UH. And thereis this amazing model out of the UK
called the Rainbow Clinic where they havewhere they have really focused on this subgroup

(21:22):
with people and improving proving both theiryou know, emotional and mental support through
the pregnancy and their actual outcomes.And so what they manages you in the
UK was get the rates in thathy risk population down to better than that
of the general population. And sowe've been watching an MV for years,
you know, through our sub pregnanciesof our counterparts in the UK get amazing

(21:48):
care and we treated like everybody elseand many cases worse and so one of
the first things we did was wasset to bring out that bring that model
to the US and the reason behindand because obviously, you know, we
don't ever want to see a parentgo through multiple still birds, of course,
but that's not going to be likemake a huge dent in the still

(22:08):
birth numbers. But the reason thatwe did that is because it's a really
easy way to get in with providers. You know, delivering a sow and
baby is the absolute worst day ofan obie's job or an L and D
nurses or anybody who's that you know, you you call. You take this
job to do to bring life intothe world, not to bring death.

(22:30):
And so, uh, you know, they are very eager and they get
no training again, no training inmedical school about any of this, and
so they are really eager to makesure that this does not happen to families
in general, and particularly not asecond time. And so they are been
really really receptive to learn more abouthow to support parents through a subsequent pregnancy

(22:56):
and also make sure that they areusing the best protocols to ensure they get
the best outcomes. You know,It's one of those things that I'm sure
for a lot of people. It'sone thing for you know, of course,
like I know that you have aplethora of information, but just even
simple things that you're right, people, could you know, hear his tips
and go, okay, those arethings that are attainable. It's not as

(23:17):
you even mentioned. I'm sure whenyou were doing research before. You know,
there's so many restrictions already and somany things that you're constantly, you
know, worried about. I wonderif you know, having a couple of
tips on different preventable ways might beless daunting at first, you know,
just because it's already like okay,I can't have seafood, and I can't

(23:40):
drink herbal tea, and I can'thave caffeine and I can't you know,
I can only have flat water,and like even what you mentioned sleeping on
my side, Oh okay, that'seasy, Like yeah, exactly. And
that's the thing where you get sofrustrated because a lot of times, if
you ask a lot of OB's likewhy aren't you talking to your patients about
stupid, They're like, oh,because there's nothing they can do, and
I don't want to scare them.And it's like, what a joke?

(24:03):
Who doesn't walk out of their firstOPI appointment with pages and pages of things
we're not allowed to do because youknow, our because our baby might die
was steria or something like that,which the risk I can't like you.
I think. I think the numberis you're ten thousand times more likely to
have a sobirth than you are foryour baby to contract with steria during pregnancy.

(24:26):
Ten thousand times And for some reasonwe're not telling anybody. And it's
like, come on, guys,like give it, give us a little
respect here, Like if we canhandle the information about the daily sandwiches,
we can handle information about SO birth. Well, okay. So the other
thing I am dying to know theexplanation for is when you say that they

(24:48):
are preventable, and you know yourexperience and in your research, what are
simple things that parents could be doingto prevent this. So we've got a
ton of tips. I will,I will, I will tell you.
Go to pushpregnancy dot org slash tipsand everything is there for you, including
some free like reminder cards that youcan save to your phone or stick on

(25:12):
your fridge or whatever you need.But the main things to know are number
one, the bunch of hashtags andagain you google any of these up online.
Hashtag know you're normal. Every pregnancyand every baby is different, So
you need to know what's normal foryour baby because you're the authority on your
own pregnancy and no one knows yourbaby or your body better than you.

(25:33):
Number two hashtag always ask if youhave any concerns. It's incredibly important that
you speak up right away because whatwe see so many times in soberth is
that there were warning signs, andmany times parents do pick up on them.
But you know, people will belike, oh, no, everything's

(25:53):
fine, I'll you know, youjust you have an appointment tomorrow, just
wait till then, or you know, it's the middle of the night,
I don't want to go to thehospital, but sometimes a couple of hours
is all you have. And ifyou and if you act right away,
there is often time to intervene.And also, you know, your provider

(26:15):
should want to hear from you.I mean, that's literally why they're there.
You know, so many of usfeel like, oh, I'm just
going to be a bother if I'mlike calling them constantly and stuff, but
it's like no, they would alwaysalways rather hear from you. Then have
you turn up and be in thesame situation that I was. So if
you have any concerns or questions,always ask right away. And if you're

(26:40):
if your if your provider is nothearing you, we say hashtag use your
mom boys. We borrow that monthfrom our friends the pre Concy Foundation because
like the CDC's uh Hear Her campaignshows a lot of times when parents do
speak up, their their concerns aregetting dismissed, and so we are always
hung parents. Like you know,there are not too many things in life

(27:02):
that are a literal life or deathsituation, but pregnancy is one of them.
And parenting starts in pregnancy, andyou will never regret advocating for your
child. And this is training forwhat you're gonna do for the rest of
their lives. So you know,speak up, and if you're not being
heard, you know, vote withyour feet and go to the provider who
will if you have the ability todo that. If not, you know,

(27:23):
do whatever it takes, because againyou're literally your or your child's life
can be on the line here.There are also other things again, sleep
on side. We talked about goingto sleep on your side in the third
trimester, measuring the placenta. Thepercenta is the baby's life sustaining organ and
do you know how often it getsmeasured throughout pregnancy? Zero times, No

(27:48):
one. The only thing they checkon the persenta is the the connection between
the court and the placenta and thelocation of it, basically make sure it's
not blocking the exit. Besides that, no one is checking your you know,
placenta's efficiency, its size, whichcan be an indicator of how well

(28:08):
it's doing and if it's if there'senough pcental tissue to sustain a baby that
is getting bigger. You know,I know a ton of mine. Unfortunately,
the placenta is there is the causeof about thirty percent of stillbirths,
especially in the third trimester, andthere's a lot of different things that contribute
to that, but the number onething is that nobody's even bothering to look

(28:30):
at this thing and make sure it'sactually working. And I know so many
parents who had stillbirths on or aftertheir due dates simply because they had a
large baby and a very tiny likeless than one percentile less than one percentile
of percenta and it simply just couldn'tsustain them anymore. And This is again

(28:55):
totally preventable. Count the Kicks.You know, the part of knowing normals
move hashtag movements, matters, hashtags, account the Kicks. There's tons of
free apps and stuff like thatt there. We particularly recommend the Count the Kicks
app from our partners at Healthy Birthdayand it literally it's a great way,
number one, to just bond withyour baby and to have an excuse every

(29:15):
day to sit down and put yourfeet up, and you know, the
whole family. You can get involved, your partner, your other children,
everybody can sit there and feel ababy kick. And it's just important to
know for your baby. You knowthat there is number one, no set
standard. That's why we say no, you're normal. This has been Virginia
Focus. I'm at Katie Gray.I hope you've enjoyed today's show. Thanks

(29:36):
for tuning into the show on yourfavorite local radio station. You can now
listen to this show or past showsthrough the iheartapp or on iHeart dot com.
Just search for Virginia Focus under podcasts. I'm Rebecca Hughes with a Virginia
News network, and I'll be herenext week on Virginia Focus.