Doula care for Life's Most Abundant Moment
Every woman who is preparing to encounter birth has the ethereal opportunity to be guided by massive and profound forces within. During labor, these forces take us out of chronological, sequential time and we are thrust into a moment of undetermined time. Known as “kairos time” this altered experience of time allows us, as women, a rare opportunity to participate directly with mystery and, consequently, life is forever changed.
As a doula, I am able to maintain a calm, centered presence and assist a woman’s partner in “holding the space” for her so that each woman may focus inward. I strive to provide relentless physical and emotional support for her and her birth partner throughout the labor. My goal is to assist in the empowerment of each woman so that she may be fully engaged in her individual process, no matter how this may look, and so that she may fully embrace her unique birth experience as her own supreme moment within kairos time.
My own birth experience allowed me access to a deep connection with my innate wisdom and resources, which served as my guide. Following a pregnancy with some complications, anxiety and fear as well as an extraordinary labor, the guide of my innate wisdom ultimately allowed me to have confidence and trust in the deeply wise process of labor, catapulting me and my husband into a joyous journey. This birth allowed me to recognize how essential this very deep connection with my inner wisdom was in guiding me into my own experience of kairos time – following the legacy of countless women before me who also served as my intuitive teachers. It will forever be my favorite “supreme moment” of life. It was only days after this birth that I began reveling in fantasy about assisting other women and their partners in birth.
As a creative-arts based psychotherapist, I am able to provide strong prenatal support to women and their partners and assist them in processing their experience of birth postnatally. Because my career as a therapist has been focused on work with trauma, and because birth can be triggering, I have a unique specialization in doula care for women who have experienced trauma, though my care is not limited here. My training in music psychotherapy allows me to provide creative opportunities for birth preparation, labor and birth review and processing as well as bonding with baby. My 15-year yoga practice also informs my doula care as I am able to bring wisdom from this discipline into my work with women as they prepare and open their bodies, minds, hearts and, of course, their breath.