Let's Talk Birth Rights | Episode 2: Court-Ordered C-Sections And "Black Robe Syndrome" (With Doula Tiara Flynn, The Phenomenal Mama) — Part 1

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A nurse walks in with a tablet. On the screen: a judge in his black robe, and a room full of hospital attorneys. The woman in the bed is in active labor — and she's about to spend nearly three hours arguing, alone, for her right to decide how she gives birth.

That really happened to Cherise Doyley in Florida in 2024, and to Brianna Bennett the year before. In this episode, I'm joined by my own doula, Tiara Flynn of The Phenomenal Mama, to break down ProPublica's reporting on court-ordered C-sections: how a court got anywhere near a laboring woman, why she had no lawyer, and what every pregnant person needs to know about informed consent and the right to refuse.

IN THIS EPISODE

• How Tiara and I met (over coffee outside a Starbucks, coming out of Covid, when none of us knew how to people anymore) — and my doula-vetting spreadsheet
• What happened to Cherise Doyley and Brianna Bennett, and why "Florida woman" headlines shouldn't make anyone feel safe in other states
• The Black maternal health crisis, the CDC's finding that 1 in 5 women report mistreatment during maternity care, and why the U.S. has some of the worst maternal outcomes in the developed world
• The history behind modern obstetrics, including experimentation on enslaved women — and why Tiara says everyone in this work should read it
• "Black robe syndrome": the legal cousin of white coat syndrome
• Bioethics 101: informed consent is a foundational principle, not a box to check
• The BRAIN acronym: Benefits, Risks, Alternatives, Intuition, Nothing
• "If they're discussing and not directing, you still have options"
• Signing a hospital form is not signing away your body: you can give consent and take it back
• How a court gets jurisdiction over anyone, and why it doesn't automatically have it over a patient
• The emergency petition for declaratory relief that brought Cherise to court — and why she had no right to appointed counsel
• ACOG's ethics position on court-ordered C-sections, and why leaving it out of the hearing is, in my view, a candor-to-the-court problem

Part 2 of this conversation is coming next week. We had a lot to say.

MEET TIARA FLYNN, THE PHENOMENAL MAMATiara is a full-spectrum doula in Las Vegas, an Air Force veteran, and a pregnancy justice advocate and speaker. She also mentors doulas through her Doula Business Blueprint. (And she was my doula.)

Website: https://thephenomenalmama.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/thepnmmama/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PNMMama

RESOURCES MENTIONED

• ProPublica, "They Didn't Want to Have C-Sections. A Judge Would Decide How They Gave Birth," by Amy Yurkanin (March 14, 2026): https://www.propublica.org/article/florida-court-ordered-c-sections
• Birth Rights Bar Association, "Birth Rights: A Resource for Everyday People to Defend Human Rights During Labor and Birth": https://birthrightsbar.org
• ACOG Committee Opinion No. 664, "Refusal of Medically Recommended Treatment During Pregnancy" (2016)
• In re Baby Boy Doe, 260 Ill. App. 3d 392, 632 N.E.2d 326 (Ill. App. Ct. 1994)
• Harriet A. Washington, Medical Apartheid
• Dorothy Roberts, Killing the Black Body

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Attorney advertising. This podcast is for educational purposes only and is not legal or medical advice. Listening does not create an attorney-client relationship. Responsible attorney: Andi Orwoll, Esq., A.D. Orwoll Legal, PLLC, dba Your Legal Doula®, Las Vegas, NV.