Jen Dugard (00:01.006)
Welcome to the Mumsafe Pro podcast. I'm your host, Jen Dugard, and today's guest is Mumsafe trainer and owner of Bay Active PT, With over 12 years experience as a personal trainer starting off in the industry, Kate's core focus was on rehabilitation and injury prevention. Using her collaboration with allied health professionals to bridge the gap between the clinical treatment and training on the gym floor.
After four years of personal training in gym based facilities, Kate opened her own boutique training facility, Bay Act of PT, and grew a team. From there, life and babies happened and Kate ultimately decided to close down that studio and is now operating her business from home. We spoke to Kate in season two, episode 37 for birth trauma awareness week, where she very bravely shared her first birth experience, which was incredibly traumatic.
In this episode, Kate shares her journey after the birth of her daughter, which includes two operations and choosing to have another baby. Listening to Kate sparks both a feeling of admiration for someone who has been through so much and learned to advocate for herself so well, alongside a feeling of frustration that A, she should never have had to, and B,
many women are still being left in the dark due to a lack of information about their own pregnancy and birth experience. I learned a lot today. And if you want to widen your awareness of the consequences of birth or other people's birth experience and how to support your clients and also how to adjust your business to suit your stage or phase of life, this is the episode for you.
Jen Dugard (00:00.162)
So Kate, welcome to the Mumsafe Pro podcast or welcome back, I should say. How are going?
Kate Turtiainen (00:06.753)
Good, very good.
Jen Dugard (00:09.172)
We're both smiling and I'm not, I'm gonna share that we've just had a shit show of it was working, then it wasn't working and now we're like almost 45 minutes later and we're trying to do it again. So neither of us knows what we said and what we haven't said so we're just gonna roll back into it. Thanks for persisting. Let's go straight in with a word, a win and something that you're working on at the moment.
Kate Turtiainen (00:25.847)
Yep, exactly.
Kate Turtiainen (00:34.115)
My word is fulfilled. I had my first one-on-one day with my daughter since my son was born and that was yesterday. It went amazingly and it included four hours of driving so no one cried. We survived the whole day. So that was really cool and what I've been working on
Jen Dugard (00:50.158)
Well done.
Jen Dugard (00:54.53)
Nice.
Kate Turtiainen (00:58.787)
as a bit of stuff in the online space. So with the break from having some maternity leave, I'm rejigging the way I'm doing things and hopefully going to be launching some new stuff in the new year.
Jen Dugard (01:13.294)
Amazing. Now, Kate, last time we spoke to you, you're a returning guest on the podcast. We spoke to you back in July of 2024, and that was specifically around Birth Trauma Awareness Week. So if anybody would like to go back and listen to that incredibly powerful episode and getting to know Kate a little bit more, please go back and listen to that. Today, we're gonna delve into a little bit about your business journey and also we're gonna touch on the birth trauma.
of the birth journey, not necessarily birth trauma journey, because since that birth, you've had another baby and with birth trauma comes a whole host of considerations that you may or may not have if you don't have that experience. should we start with the business stuff and then circle back around to the birth stuff? Does that sound okay? Awesome. Kate, tell us a little bit about how you got into
Kate Turtiainen (01:47.853)
Mm-hmm.
Kate Turtiainen (01:57.325)
Yeah.
Kate Turtiainen (02:02.967)
Yeah, sounds good.
Jen Dugard (02:09.784)
the fitness industry in the first place and you can kind of talk a bit more about how you ended up working with mums. I think that's a good place to start.
Kate Turtiainen (02:19.043)
How I ended up working with Mum, that comes many years down the track. But I started off working, well I went to PT College straight out of high school. I wasn't even 18 yet, so was 17, got qualified, couldn't get a lease anywhere. Couldn't really do a lot of things that I really wanted to. And I ended up coming back home and shadow training in...
Jen Dugard (02:24.014)
Kate Turtiainen (02:46.157)
the local gym, trying to make sure that I felt like I knew what I had learnt and I had consolidated that and had it in practice. That rolled into a reception job in a gym, which rolled into just talking with people, people asking to train with me and I built a client basis. Down the track from that.
The gym made all their employed trainers subcontractors and that's when my business began. So that was an interesting journey to kind of shift after a few years of being an employee trainer to running your own business. I think I was like 20, 21 around then.
and there was a very, very steep learning curve. As I'm sure any personal trainer who starts a business, no one gets into it to run a business, ever. We get into it because we love working with people. So I suppose my initial interest in the industry came from...
having an injury when I was a kid. I had an ankle reconstruction when I was 15, which resulted from an injury when I was 10. So doctors kept saying, you're young, you'll heal. And it turned out it just didn't. And it was just painful and uncomfortable. And eventually through working with physios and that we got to this point where, yeah, I could.
go have this surgery, got fixed up, and I just enjoyed the process of working with people, working with the physio, and that kind of led me down this road of wanting to work with people on how they move. And I felt, yeah, that PT was the way for me to go. And so I was known as like the rehab trainer in the gym, and that followed me when I opened my studio.
Kate Turtiainen (04:33.235)
It was probably about, I think about 11 months after going to a subcontractor that actually opened my first studio. It was a tiny little box and you know, with different leasing issues and that, I ended up moving to other premises and have always continued to have that relationship with physiotherapists, chiropractors, basically anyone who can help me have a better understanding of my clients.
and then progressed from there to working with mums. It felt like the natural transition as I became more aware of one wanting to have baby babies and then having a baby, having the experience that I had, all those things played into that.
Jen Dugard (05:00.877)
Hmm.
Jen Dugard (05:20.686)
So you've always had that connection to allied health or that partnership throughout the journey that you've had as a PT.
Kate Turtiainen (05:27.083)
Yeah, from day dot have always worked really closely with physios and have, yeah, just found a way to make those connections. And so I've worked with some of the same allied health professionals for like 10 plus years. So it's really good to have that great relationship with them where you can talk to them and go, hey.
This is just walking my dog. Can I have help? Or they refer me clients and they're like, we think you're the right person to work with this case. And that's really nice to hear that.
Jen Dugard (05:59.343)
important do you think that that trainer allied health relationship is?
Kate Turtiainen (06:05.079)
I think it's everything to be honest. It's inevitable that some stage in your life you're have some sort of injury. Like no one gets to, unless you just sit in the lounge room on the couch and never move. But then you're gonna have, exactly, then you're gonna have the other problem. You're gonna have cardiovascular, know, like then there's all the other issues. So there are gonna be injuries in life and.
Jen Dugard (06:18.84)
Like, baby, gonna have more problems.
Jen Dugard (06:27.074)
Yeah.
Kate Turtiainen (06:30.027)
you need to see the right people and then there needs to be a transitioning space. And that's where I always found that I fell was between, you know, being able to go to the gym on yourself and just smash it out versus rehab with a physio. And there's like this leap that's really hard to cross on your own. And that's kind of where I fit or where I've felt I've fitted in the industry for a long time.
Jen Dugard (06:49.4)
Hmm.
Jen Dugard (06:55.222)
Yep. I knew Kate you had a studio and tell us about the transition, the studio you had last and then you made the decision to transition out of that. Tell me, tell me more.
Kate Turtiainen (07:09.091)
No, well, it's been a journey. So I've been in three different spaces. Like I said, I started in a really tiny box with a really safe option, but I very quickly outgrew it. I was outgrown when I first started, really. And then I went to a slightly bigger space with the intention of bringing on staff, started to bring on staff and wasn't happy in my leasing situation.
Jen Dugard (07:11.502)
Hmm.
Kate Turtiainen (07:38.925)
progressed on to what I would have called my dream building, put on an extra staff member and progressively babies were born, people live too far away, all those things and I didn't have my staff anymore. So I had a bigger premises with Just Me Now.
and I decided to downsize all of that. It just felt like it got too big to handle. So downsized it. I was moving in with a physiotherapist that I worked really closely with. a week and a half before we were going to open, we were meeting electricians there to mark out some extra power points and that. The space flooded.
So I now am running sessions. I'm very lucky. I live on a couple of acres, close to town. So I now run sessions from home, which has been a transition. I don't know how long it will stay like this. I don't know if it will stay like this forever. I don't know if it will change. It's likely to change. But when it changes, it's probably, given the latest baby, probably this is a nice way to work at the moment for me.
Jen Dugard (08:42.318)
Mm.
Jen Dugard (08:59.278)
Yeah, it is easy working from home, I, it's maybe in some ways it's not easy working from home. don't know. It depends if you're someone that needs that kind of the delineation between home and work.
Kate Turtiainen (09:12.161)
Yes, yes, I'm that sort of person. Very much so. Like I'm like in my office, we put the front of the house, you know, training space, you know, it's all away from the main living space. But because I know it's there, my brain is like, so many things to do for work. Like you really could just go in and do them. And then I try and rush, you know, a four or five year old to get what they need to get done so I can get my things done. And that's never going to work. yeah.
Jen Dugard (09:13.984)
Okay, got it.
Jen Dugard (09:24.611)
Yep.
Jen Dugard (09:37.615)
How do you find that Kate? Because there's so many people that I mean we can talk because you've been in the fitness, a lot of people that I work with come into working in the fitness space after they've had a baby. They've, or they might have been a trainer before but they're now transitioning to working with mums but a lot of them transition into the fitness industry after they've had a baby. For yourself it's been literally your whole life and then you've slaughtered the children.
Kate Turtiainen (10:01.025)
Yeah.
Jen Dugard (10:05.044)
in there, how has that changed the way that you approach your business and also potentially the clientele that you attract? Yeah, and any other changes and things that you've had to deal with along the way?
Kate Turtiainen (10:20.351)
I think it's still evolving. Like I said, I've got some stuff that I'm working on that I want to release in the new year. Some of that was intended to be released while I was on maternity leave, but the beauty of technology that didn't actually come about. The transition has been interesting, I guess. it's, my business has evolved. had goals of what I wanted to get to.
Jen Dugard (10:27.118)
Mm.
Kate Turtiainen (10:47.649)
got to those goals, it was great. Like when I had a team working with me and all those things, and I just had my baby, that was great. I actually got to work on my business, not just in it for a while. And I found my rhythm, my sweet spot where I wanted to be. But in a more rural area, coastal rural area.
It's not always as easy with staff issues and that sort of thing. There's not a massive pool of people and unfortunately I am also super picky, which means that there's requirements that to work for me you had to, that was just a non-negotiable. So I suppose that...
Jen Dugard (11:30.658)
Hmm.
Kate Turtiainen (11:34.805)
evolution there is kind of one step, wanting to have that dream of the team and wanting to build that space and I built the space and it didn't work. So I guess it's just an evolution. That's the only way I can put it is it's an evolution.
Jen Dugard (11:50.382)
It is, but it's...
But it's so hard to let go, isn't it? Like you've built this dream and then you see how you feel, how good it can be with a team and you're working on the business. And then how did you, I mean, I think I remember speaking to you a while ago and you're like, I've got no stuff. I'm literally doing everything. Like this is where I've got to. For some people it can be very hard to let go of the dream regardless of what shit show that they're sitting in. What was the tipping point for you and what?
Kate Turtiainen (12:19.65)
Yeah.
Jen Dugard (12:23.744)
allowed you, because sometimes we just need permission to change things, what gave you permission to close down the studio and do it different?
Kate Turtiainen (12:36.098)
I think the sacrifice started to become too much. Like when I've always wanted to be a really present mum, I also want to have my own business, know, do all those things and with everything. And I think this is probably a little bit of a generational thing as well. We were told we can have anything, we can do anything as long as we put our mind to it.
the kind of caveat on that or the thing that gets missed out is there will be some degree of sacrifice. So you either, if you're working in your business, on your business, you are sacrificing time away from the family. If you are with the family, you're sacrificing time away from your business goals. So it's when that became too much, it was.
felt like it was tearing me apart from the inside, to be honest. And then on top of that, I had the medical flow on from my first child's birth that had to be dealt with. it was opportunities arising at the same time. So I suppose I was shutting down the big studio, but I had the option to go on with this physio that...
I feel like we work incredibly well together and I thought that was going to be the ultimate solution. And then I didn't get a choice in the flood of space. it's never been my first choice to work from home, but it does have its benefits that I can see. So for now, I'm content. Content.
Jen Dugard (14:04.36)
Yeah.
Jen Dugard (14:15.714)
Content, good, good, I like that, I like that. Kate, we were talking before about when people come into your space and we use specific language when we're talking to them as clients. Do you wanna share a little bit about the conversation that you're having and the importance of language with our, especially our female clients?
Kate Turtiainen (14:38.455)
But yeah, so I regularly have these conversations. I will be, whether we are training or I'm doing an initial assessment, you pick up a fair bit of it during an initial assessment with a client, the language that they use to describe themselves, the language they use to describe an injury or even an experience, the way they experience themselves and how they go into a space.
that language really impacts, know, we are our words, we become our words, I guess. So.
when someone comes in and you're talking and we're going through the things and they're like, I'm just, I'm a of a weirdo. Like my body's a bit strange or like, no, actually everyone's body's got weird and wonderful things. That's, you know, what makes us unique. That's a way to reframe that. But I think we get so conditioned from the language that surrounds us as women, particularly in that becoming a mother, whether it be
birthing failure to progress or a geriatric pregnancy. Like all these terms are woefully shit. Like they're terrible. They're terrible. And here you have like a woman that's, let's say birthing, that everyone, all the literature, all the experts know that they are in a vulnerable space.
Jen Dugard (15:54.86)
Yes they are!
Kate Turtiainen (16:07.139)
They're gonna have the most horrific hormonal crash in three days time. They've been through a life altering experience and some people have a positive experience, some people have a negative, some have a meh. But it's life altering and then we use words like you failed to progress or all these things.
I get that that's medical terminology, but we don't need to be in that vulnerable state having these messages sent to us so that when we go out back out into the world and you're struggling to find or redefine your identity after becoming a mum, that you're then, you know, the first kind of terms that are sitting in your head is that I failed at this or, you know, so it starts that language of being negative.
And I don't think we need that. think there needs to be an overall hall of medical language. And then we need to be really conscious of how we talk to ourselves as females in general, but very much once you become a mum.
Jen Dugard (17:03.117)
Hmm.
Jen Dugard (17:12.706)
I was gonna say, do you think it starts pre that for women or for females? Pre birth?
Kate Turtiainen (17:17.397)
It does to a degree. A lot of people, when I had my daughter, expected me to have her in the studio a lot, wear her in the studio a lot. And I made a really conscious decision not to do that because I was super aware of how my clients talk about their bodies. although, yeah, although...
Jen Dugard (17:36.834)
That's fascinating.
Kate Turtiainen (17:39.956)
I do as much as I can to reframe that. see, might see them for, let's say, an hour a week or two hours a week. I can't completely reframe the way they talk about themselves. They've got to want to do it in their own time as well. So I made a really conscious decision to not bring my daughter into the studio a lot, even though it may have been more convenient at times.
for that very reason is I don't want her to learn the behaviors that I'm trying to break. get breaking others, that sounds horrible. But yeah, so we very quickly pick up, we learn by watching and what we're surrounded with.
Jen Dugard (18:12.28)
Mmm.
Kate Turtiainen (18:23.203)
So just like as a business owner or an entrepreneur, you try and put yourself around the people you aspire to be. Your child is going to be watching you and they're aspiring to be like you. Like I'm very conscious at the moment. My daughter's obsessed with anything I do or say. So I know if anything naughty comes out of her mouth, I've probably said it. So we've got to be conscious of what we're saying. Yeah. But very much, you know, the mind believes what you say to it.
Jen Dugard (18:49.07)
Mmm.
Jen Dugard (18:53.806)
Absolutely. I think there's so much work to do. think we feel like we've progressed, but in many ways we've not gotten. I feel like that about my whole career. Like I feel like we've gone come so far in the last 17 years, but not gone anywhere at all. When you just scratch, scratch the surface a little bit. Kate, you talked then about birth and failure to progress. that terminology that was used in your experience?
Kate Turtiainen (19:09.25)
Yeah.
Kate Turtiainen (19:20.407)
Yes, value to progress was used. I don't recall if it was used at the time of birthing or if it was just what was said to me during my debriefing. That in itself, that's probably even worse in my opinion, in a debriefing like after a traumatic experience, you're going back into a space that you're uncomfortable with. So...
Jen Dugard (19:29.336)
Mm-hmm.
Jen Dugard (19:34.562)
Yep.
Kate Turtiainen (19:45.646)
from a trauma perspective, I had to go back into the hospital where I had a traumatic experience to have the debriefing, which obviously there's a lot of medical people who can't stray far from the hospital. It wasn't a different part of the hospital, but I know I had the hot sweats like rocking up there and by the end of it, I just got in my car and cried afterwards. So if someone's then explained to you, well, it was a failure to progress and they're talking about it like it's very simple.
Jen Dugard (20:03.822)
Mmm.
Kate Turtiainen (20:14.231)
You know, that's someone in a very vulnerable state that you're, although you're trying to help by telling them details of what happened, that language is shattering. And I suppose definitely to someone whose occupation is about, you know, I like watching people achieve and progress in their goals. My goal was to birth a baby. I guess I did birth a baby, but not the way I intended.
Jen Dugard (20:40.942)
Mmm.
Not the way I was supposed to, is probably. Yeah, that's fascinating to me from a trauma care perspective that a debrief from a traumatic birth was done in the, I don't know, I heard you say it was done in a different part of the hospital, but surely there could be a different building or something like people who go five minutes down the road or, yeah, anyway, we could open that kind of, that care, it's insane.
Kate Turtiainen (20:46.474)
Exactly.
Kate Turtiainen (21:07.073)
yeah, it's a totally, yeah. I have distinct recollections of like, I got wheeled down this hallway and went down in this lift, you know? And for someone who's, I was probably a lot more traumatized than I realized at the time. I was very convinced that if I told myself I was okay, you know, I could hold it together.
Jen Dugard (21:16.398)
Wow.
Jen Dugard (21:27.694)
Hmm.
Kate Turtiainen (21:29.731)
but looking back now and particularly after having my second birth, it's amazing what they expect you to know. Even when it comes to trauma, like if you are, I forget the term, but when you're constantly thinking about what's happened or you're having intrusive thoughts.
or reliving an experience. I didn't think that I did that. I thought, you know, I just thought about it a normal amount, but no, I did. I had very intrusive thoughts and I thought about it way too much. But I don't, like that's hindsight after having, I guess, a second birth and a retake on that experience, being able to see that it could be very different.
Jen Dugard (21:47.671)
Yep.
Jen Dugard (22:06.338)
Hmm.
Jen Dugard (22:11.064)
Kate, so if we start to then think about the second birth, what is the consideration after you've had a traumatic experience with the first baby? I can't imagine it's, yay, let's just go again straight away. What was that experience like for you?
Kate Turtiainen (22:30.083)
I think my first question in the early days was would I be able to conceive again was the first question. During my daughter's or in the hours that followed my daughter's birth, they were talking about...
or getting me to sign waivers to have a hysterectomy then. So not knowing what state my internal organs were going to be in, that was definitely a consideration. But my partner and I are very lucky. My husband is an incredible human, incredibly supportive, and we always tried to have an open conversation about.
where I was at, what we were thinking. And when we decided we wanted to go again, it was kind of when everyone took the other issues I've had moving forward from the first birth, which was a lot of chronic kind of pain issues, that sort of thing, got taken really seriously because it's all of a sudden it started to become a fertility issue. And it's really interesting that...
that was when it was taken really seriously. this is possibly preventing this person from falling pregnant. Okay, let's do stuff. And I managed to get referrals to people who then took me really seriously. And then once I had an amazing team, everything got dealt with super quickly, which was amazing. But it took multiple years to get to that point, which is kind of...
Relay is like it's a key in the teeth. It's like, I still have this pain from this trauma experience. And although, you know, I did work with a psychologist, that's something you've got to always then think about and negotiate with your head.
Jen Dugard (24:23.406)
And then what implication you decide to have another baby, try and have another baby, what then was the journey like from there?
Kate Turtiainen (24:31.906)
Yeah.
Kate Turtiainen (24:35.299)
The journey to conceiving again involved two surgeries. So once I found a specialist that took my pain issue seriously, she was incredible.
she immediately just took more time to talk to me, which was very respectful of my experience. She said, look, I've read it all, but I want to hear it from you. And I want you to tell me how you feel like it's impacting you now, which was no one had done that in that way. That was amazing. And she basically gave me, you know,
Jen Dugard (25:06.094)
Hmm.
Kate Turtiainen (25:12.365)
four step approach is like, first we're gonna manage your pain. Like that's the first priority. Let's get some medication on that and see if we can level that out. She goes, want you to have a scan. It was a high COSY scan, which had to be done out of my area. There's a lot of things I have to travel out of my area for. So that wasn't unexpected. And...
Then she said, following that, can look at, you know, there's options of surgical options and that, but let's go from there. But basically she got the scan results of the hycozy and she's like, we're going straight to surgery. Like this is more than like 50 % of your uterus is actually just.
blocked its scar tissue. In the high COSY scan, the doctor who performed the scan actually said it looked like a unicornus. I always say unicornus like a unicorn, but it's basically a uterus that only has one fallopian tube it looks like. And that was due to...
the scar tissue that had an adhesion that had grown in my uterus following the birth experience. And that makes also the hycozy scan quite excruciatingly painful, which now that I've had follow up ones that that issue was resolved, I can vouch that, yeah, it's not supposed to be that painful. The first attempt to remove all those, scarring.
Jen Dugard (26:44.856)
Mmm.
Kate Turtiainen (26:50.307)
It all re-adhered. During the surgery they couldn't even get through 50 % of it, so I was always going to have to go back in again.
But this incredible doctor that I was working with said, look, I think you need to go to the professor that specialises in this, in Ashman's, was what the diagnosis ended up being after they went in and had a look. They also went in laparoscopically and they found that part of my bowel had been wrapped around and adhered to my rama ovary. So that was contributing to my pain as well.
So that was kind of two procedures in one. She referred me off to the professor at the Women's Health and Research Centre in Sydney, Professor Van Kuy, and he was wonderful. We had an online consult before I had my procedure, so there wasn't probably as much time I spent with him, but he is leading the field.
in Ashmans and he did an incredible job. actually laser cut all the adhesions out and diagnosed with what they call stage three Ashman. So I think there's about a 30 % chance after having stage three Ashman's that you can conceive. And he said, you're good to go. Start trying again. And that resulted.
You know, I don't know, like six or eight weeks later I was pregnant and it was like, well, this is happening now. And then you've got to deal with all the feelings that happen throughout the process.
Jen Dugard (28:21.951)
Mm.
Jen Dugard (28:30.796)
Yeah, I am. There's so much in it, isn't there? think people are probably wondering what happened first time around. We'll let them go back and listen to that episode because it's all there. We don't need to have it again now. I want to be super thankful for you to sharing it because there's so, like even when we first started talking before we started recording, Asherman's is something that I'd never heard of. So I got Dr. Google out and it's just for anyone listening. It's a condition where scar tissue or adhesions.
Kate Turtiainen (28:32.749)
Thank you.
Kate Turtiainen (28:39.884)
Yes!
Jen Dugard (28:59.608)
form inside the uterus or the cervix from surgical interventions related to pregnancy. So that was from your birth experience. What then happened around the birth or with the placenta? Kate, share with us about that because that was something I had also never heard of.
Kate Turtiainen (29:20.099)
I had an accretor or an incretor. So there's kind of like three levels. There's accretor, incretor and percretor. So it's talking about the depth at which the placenta grows through the uterine wall. This is sometimes seen around C-section scars. So the issue I had is when I'd go into scans, everyone would check around my C-section scar and I'd say, no, I've...
I've had Ashman's, you need to check the whole upper left quadrant of my uterus because that is all, although the adhesions were cut out, the muscle tissue of the uterus was still very deeply scarred. So they needed to check that. And that was the thing that a lot of even obstetricians didn't.
have enough knowledge about with this pregnancy. And it wasn't until someone higher up flagged that it was an issue, that that changed the whole experience with this one as well. Yeah, it's an up reader is, yeah, the person to basically throw it through because there's not enough endometrium tissue for it to go at tier two.
Jen Dugard (30:34.574)
And what's the consequence of that cake? Like what? What's the outcome?
Kate Turtiainen (30:40.958)
When you birth your baby, you've had your baby, your placenta needs to come away. It's basically stuck. It's either through the initial kind of lining or through the muscle to the outer part of the uterus, or it can even actually grow through and start to attach.
Jen Dugard (30:50.818)
Mm.
Kate Turtiainen (31:00.267)
to other organs and that basically results in massive hemorrhaging, so massive blood loss. So it makes things quite risky when it comes to delivery. Yeah. So.
Jen Dugard (31:06.67)
Mm.
Jen Dugard (31:14.51)
So what was the, yeah, what was your, what happened in the delivery? Like.
Kate Turtiainen (31:19.777)
Yeah, so I, after it finally kind of got picked up that I had this possible accretive, I had to have a fetal MRI to try and confirm. And even that isn't like they have things they look for, but they never a hundred percent knows, but they will work off the fact that they are assuming worst case scenario if they have signs of an accretive because it can be so detrimental. In my case,
it meant I had to stay close to the hospital pretty much from that point that they picked that up. I did sneak home for a weekend for my birthday and stuff like that. I refused to stay away from home and family for that. But went back up and had to stay within five minutes from the hospital or they were going to admit me. That was kind of my options. They put together a surgical team. Depending on when they pick this up, depends on
This mine happened like this happened in like a week and a half it went from we're gonna let you go to 39 weeks to we are getting this baby out as soon as we've got a surgical team together because I was further along in my pregnancy. Yeah, so in my case, normally if it's around the C-section scar, that's fine. They will just go in through the C-section scar and deal with it that way. In my case, because it was a lot higher that meant that they
wanted to go in through a vertical incision. I had a cut from basically my, well your traditional C-section scar is up to my belly button so that they could access the point that was gonna be the issue. So they had really clear visibility and yeah, so they, the downside to that is that they had to put me under a general anesthetic, which was probably the saddest bit of it all for me. I really wanted to be there
because I didn't feel like I was, I was so unwell when my daughter was born from the blood loss that I didn't feel as much like I was there as I wanted to be. So being put under general anesthetic was a bit devastating to come to terms with, I guess at first. But the team was incredible. Like the team that worked with me, I could not speak.
Kate Turtiainen (33:43.16)
highly enough about. They gave me so much support throughout the process and they let me make the final call, but they very much laid out what they would prefer to do and why. And they gave me all the details and let me ask as many questions as I wanted. Yeah, it was really impressive the way they handled my case. And yeah, I didn't feel dismissed or anything like that, which had been my previous experience, I guess.
Jen Dugard (34:12.462)
And I think that's the experience of a lot of women, right? They feel they're not educated the whole way through and therefore they're not empowered to make those decisions.
Kate Turtiainen (34:15.093)
Okay.
Kate Turtiainen (34:24.899)
Definitely. And like we do our best. have, you only know what you know and you try and put your trust in the professionals. Excuse me. You try and put your trust in the professionals around you. So you think if you're going to an obstetrician or a gynaecologist, they are going to know best for you. But I know there's certain things and certain things that, certain factors that I brought up.
Jen Dugard (34:37.144)
Okay.
Kate Turtiainen (34:54.209)
with my surgical team that made them kind of think about the way they were attacking it. And one of the things I said to them is I regularly lift like daily over 40 kilos. So is what you're going to do going to mean that I'm gonna end up with prolapses early or anything like that? And for that reason, they took different approaches. And I really appreciate that because there was no ego in the room.
You know, I prepared myself before the surgery and had like a pre-written letter because I knew I'd be trying to focus on more my mental state going into theatre. And they took that around to the whole team and the whole team read it. And then they all met me like a team of, I don't know, 14, 15 people in the pre-op space. And they're like, okay, we're going to talk you through this. If there's anything you don't understand, excuse me.
please just keep asking. We've got all day, we can stay here with you until we work this out. We're not gonna start till you're ready. know, totally different to my first experience.
Jen Dugard (36:06.122)
What would you say Kate to somebody that has got something ahead of them that they really feel like they need to understand the decisions that are going to be made for them? Because I think so often in a birth experience exactly like what happened with you the first time is you you're not prepared for what happens therefore you don't know how to prepare for what's going to happen because you've not had the experience yet so there's part of me that's like well you were able to do that because of what happened.
which is incredible that you got that out of that. Should have never happened to you in the first place, should. But how do we, so there's two ways to look at it. One way to look at it is if somebody has been through a similar experience as you or of their own experience, how can they go and advocate for themselves after that? But the second part of the question is how do we get that from the get go?
Kate Turtiainen (36:35.65)
Yeah.
Kate Turtiainen (36:40.652)
Yeah.
Kate Turtiainen (36:53.059)
Hmm.
Kate Turtiainen (37:00.897)
Yeah, look.
Kate Turtiainen (37:06.177)
I know when it came to making some of these calls about incision type and all that sort of stuff, I drew on every single professional that I have made contact with in the last four or five years, like every single one. At the time, I don't even think you probably knew, but I was reaching out into our group going,
Is there any information? Have we had any guest speakers in talking about vertical incisions and the impact that that has on recovery? Like I've reached out to everyone, my women's health physio that I work with that also has treated me in the past, my musculoskeletal physio, my scar tissue physio that specialises in that, my naturopath, like everyone.
And I wanted their perspective on each different element. So from a hormonal perspective, one of the options was a hysterectomy and wanting to understand that. From a understanding surgical incisions and potential scar tissue adhesions, all of that. But again, I've built that team up.
in my case specifically over the last four five years. So that's including osteoids that specialise in scar tissue. So there was a massive team and they all knew that when I was calling that I was getting close and they all knew things change really quickly and I was very blessed that they all got back to me.
and squeezed me in for telehealth to help me talk through options and directed me to research articles. But I think the best way that we could help women know this stuff before they are put in that position or before they have trauma, because otherwise, how the hell do know? I didn't know when I was training women, you know, if they need to be seeing.
Kate Turtiainen (39:16.577)
a women's health physio while they're pregnant. They need to have an incredible team that they are.
brought to as part of the pregnancy or preconception process. So like you go to a fertility specialist, if you're having issues conceiving, there needs to be, okay, pregnant. Yes, you're going to have your midwives checked and all that. But also we'd really like you at 20 weeks to go to this Women's Health Video Appointment funded by Medicare. Not subtle at all there, but it should be funded by Medicare.
Jen Dugard (39:53.56)
Don't be subtle. Yep.
Kate Turtiainen (39:54.98)
should be funded by Medicare and they should be like a Medicare mental health plan. They should be a Medicare women's health plan or pregnancy plan, whatever you want to call it. Because so many of these issues that get run into are dealt with after the fact. It's not dealt with when it could have been prevented or, you know, there's so many things. I even mentioned to my doctor and my
midwife at the time that I was nervous that I'd heard these different things about women with various histories that I have. I have history of horse riding, dancing competitively, all these, but these can relate to basically struggles in birthing and longer birth times. But no one, no, you're strong, you're fit, you you're all healthy. These are all good signs.
Yeah, those connections weren't necessarily.
put together and the sad thing is we are like, I think I can see it in just the women I'm treating. I don't know if we look through the rest of the community of even just mom safe trainers, what they're saying, but I'm sure they'd agree. We have women training at more elite levels day in, day out, because they know how to look after their bodies better now from general health perspective. We are encouraged to exercise. So you now have women doing crossfit.
at what CrossFit is, it's a combination of Olympic lifting and gymnastics. So they are elite level things and we are saying that they're general population and treating them like that but yet they're training so much harder than that. So we are going to see these issues that used to only appear in the Olympic athletes or you know and I think it's really sad that the system hasn't progressed with this, that this is still something that is
Jen Dugard (41:50.413)
Hmm.
Kate Turtiainen (41:52.496)
I think we had a discussion recently within Mum Safe about how they're looking at very much at menopause at the moment, which is brilliant. It's great they're putting funding into menopause. But why don't we try and fix a lot of the issues before it gets to that? Why don't we look at...
how women are going through life on the hormonal roller coaster and what can we do to help them earlier so that they aren't having these issues later? What can we do pre-pregnancy, during pregnancy to prevent post-pregnancy issues? It's a band-aid, we're not doing preventative health.
Jen Dugard (42:34.454)
I'm right here with you. We are not doing preventative health, I think is the statement. No, it's, it's, yeah, we are. And it's a conversation that I feel like is being had a lot in a lot of spaces. And I always have this awareness of how do we actually ignite change as well as voicing our frustrations? Because when you only voice your frustrations, it gets.
Kate Turtiainen (42:36.547)
I know, I feel like this is a conversation like, yeah, it's we're all saying it.
Jen Dugard (43:02.488)
tired, right? People stop listening. But we've not voiced it anywhere near enough yet for people to, or for the right people to start to change things. And I do believe that that's from the government level, like from federal government to a state level to our fitness industry. And I think it highlights to me that never before, never.
Never has there been a more important time for the fitness industry to play their role in helping women get support because at the moment it's not in those other places, it's not general knowledge. We are the ones that are on the ground that have this opportunity to
give pass this knowledge on to a fuckload of women because we see them on a regular basis and we can say you're pregnant, okay, you go and see the physio. And it is an elitist thing. should be on Medicare. Absolutely should be on Medicare because as soon as you say it out loud that they should be going there, well, only the people that can afford to go there or that have health insurance can actually go there. But I think the army that is the fitness industry and what you're doing in your community and all of our other Mumsafe trainers are doing is so incredibly important to.
Kate Turtiainen (44:00.355)
Yeah.
Jen Dugard (44:09.686)
Ignite that change and to do what we can with the little that we have really.
Kate Turtiainen (44:14.115)
Well, and it continues to flow on like the you then talk about a breastfeeding mother, let's say, and we're told to take pregnancy supplements throughout our pregnancy. But then a breastfeeding mother isn't told to supplement at all. And if you look and you do any research into what is needed to do that, it's no wonder women are getting so depleted.
and so unwell and getting sick and run down and then their mental health starts to suffer.
And at the end of the day, people are like, but you're just a tired mom. It's like, no, no, I'm literally having the life sucked out of me. And no one told me maybe I should be taking a supplement for that. Maybe I should continue taking my either post pregnancy or my pregnancy supplement to ensure that I'm having all the things that I need to support myself. Like we could reduce so much damage with really simple changes.
Jen Dugard (45:01.016)
Mm-hmm.
Kate Turtiainen (45:19.525)
But they're not, again, it's not something that's available to people who don't have health insurance or don't talk to or don't have the availability of naturopaths and physicians that are up on these things. Not even every doctor is well-trained in breastfeeding either. they don't, yeah, the understanding of the demand on a mother from preconception.
Jen Dugard (45:19.959)
Hmm.
Kate Turtiainen (45:47.267)
through the rest of her life is just, it's all band-aid, band-aided from whatever happens.
Jen Dugard (45:52.012)
Mm.
Jen Dugard (45:55.723)
If you could wave a magic wand, what's the one thing that you would change? Only one.
Kate Turtiainen (46:00.42)
No, I can't. can't say that. I can. Like, number one priority would be getting some sort of support for women. So it would be making it accessible to every woman who's pregnant or trying to conceive. But even that, like...
Jen Dugard (46:15.318)
Women or Mums? Okay.
Kate Turtiainen (46:24.779)
It actually shouldn't even be that. It should be to just women in general. I had a client only the other week that I had a suspicion of something going on with her pelvic floor. And I said, look, there's other indicators going on in your body that you wouldn't relate to pelvic floor, but this is what I feel like is happening. Will you give me the space to be able to work through this with you? I've been getting text messages throughout the week. My body feels so different. Thank you so much for taking me through that.
And it's just that down training, like being able to breathe properly. Yeah.
Jen Dugard (46:59.32)
Relaxing.
Yeah, so you did pelvic floor relaxation things with her. Yeah.
Kate Turtiainen (47:05.699)
Yep, breath training, public floor, relaxation, and just, you know, looking at that, looking at the coincidences that pop up in the body that aren't really coincidences. You know.
Jen Dugard (47:20.076)
Red flags, little red flags. But if we don't know what they are, we can't recognize them, right?
Kate Turtiainen (47:24.907)
Yeah, and I suppose some of it, you've got to have that relationship to be able to do that with a client. I'm like, look, are you ready to follow me down the rabbit hole? I have a suspicion this is really going to help you. I can't guarantee it. It's not going to hurt. But if we get a positive response from this, I want you to go and see a Women's Health video because that is where you need to be. But this will give you an indication if that's where you need to be.
Yeah, I think the communication between the different occupations or industries looking after women needs to be improved too. So from midwives to women's health physios, like if all of that started to flow better, because we have birthing knowledge, we have women's health physio knowledge.
Gynecologists, I've listened to a podcast a while ago and there was a gynecologist that didn't understand the muscle anatomy. Like they knew the uterus, that was their specialty and 100%, that's brilliant. But they didn't actually understand the muscular anatomy around that of the pelvic floor. And that to me, I'm like, that's really important. We can specialize, but we also have to have a global understanding of the area we're working in.
Jen Dugard (48:33.592)
Mm.
Jen Dugard (48:42.24)
It is. It is.
Jen Dugard (48:48.014)
Well, yeah, absolutely. I've definitely been in specialist appointments with a gynaecologist that someone's asked a question about abdominal separation. They've just got to just do some setups. It'll heal itself. And it's just like, no, just because you do that doesn't mean that you get that. Kate, I feel like we should we could talk for a really long time. I'm very aware that because of our technical issues, we need to wrap it up so you can go look after your little one and then look after some clients.
Kate Turtiainen (49:00.461)
Yeah.
Kate Turtiainen (49:05.44)
I'm
Jen Dugard (49:12.312)
Thank you so much for creating time and space to come back onto the podcast today. I feel like it's been a really good, and I do hope people go back and listen to the start of your journey. I learned some stuff today that I had no clue about. And I think that as women, we spend so much time thinking that what we're going through, nobody else does, or we're alone in what we are. So I wanted to thank you one for the amazing work you do and the contribution you have to what we do here at Mumsafe, but also for...
raising awareness of something that a lot of people don't know about and like I said are potentially suffering alone because it's not, hopefully not everyone's experience. Thank you.
Kate Turtiainen (49:50.115)
thank you for having me. I know we kind of we managed to pull it together. know, tech issues and all, we made it.
Jen Dugard (49:56.214)
We did, Somehow. Yes, yes. And we will keep marching on towards the change that we want to see in this space. Kate, have a beautiful afternoon.
Kate Turtiainen (50:06.083)
Thank you so much, Jen, for having me.
