The following post is a collective account of friends and clients who have shared their postpartum experiences with me over the years. It is our hope that our stories will help those who read them. The personal stories at the end were gathered more recently, and I would like to give a special thanks to …
Continue reading "Life with a new baby: the first two weeks"
When you hire a care provider to support you during your birth, they will want to monitor you and your baby during labor to ensure everyone is tolerating the process well. Most care providers use some sort of electronic fetal monitoring (EFM) to monitor your baby's heart rate during labor. There are two types of …
Continue reading "How electronic fetal monitoring (EFM) impacts your birth"
There is a movement that has been taking over the doula community, and that is the idea that doulas provide unbiased support. Maybe some do. Maybe some doulas have completely purged themselves of every ounce of bias they've ever possessed. However, I am not there yet, nor will I claim to be 100% bias-free. I …
More and more I am seeing my Birth Boot Camp students and doula clients being diagnosed with low amniotic fluid levels as they near the end of pregnancy. It has gotten to the point that if they are in my class during the summer months or if they have a due date near any major …
Continue reading "What to do if you have low amniotic fluid"
Sometimes my two worlds collide. I have a background in music, so I often use what I have learned from that world with my doula clients. Most people understand the power of music; from the mood-enhancing benefits to the intelligence-boosting. Music calms, energizes, inspires, and beautifies our world. It helps people accomplish things they didn't …
Have you ever wanted to pick a doula’s brain about your birth but did not want to hire a doula to attend your birth? In these sessions, we meet to answer any and all questions you have regarding your upcoming birth. In these sessions, we can: Create a stellar birth plan Discuss policies and procedures …
Continue reading "Now Offering Birth Planning Sessions in Houston"
It seems like people are so busy these days. There aren't enough hours in the day to accomplish everything we want to accomplish. We keep pushing ourselves to work more, do more, and be more. It seems like accomplishment is the name of the game most days. How many things can we check off our …
Continue reading "Why I don’t want to be a super busy doula"
Remember when you were in grade school and all you had to do to make friends was waltz up to another kid and ask, "Will you be my friend?" I do! Sometimes I miss those days and how easy it was to make friends. Somewhere along the line, we grow up, and it goes against …
It has come to my attention that there may be some misconceptions out there about how doulas support clients in labor. I want to clear those up. Doulas do NOT try to prevent clients from receiving pain meds in labor. This bears repeating. Doulas do NOT try to prevent their clients from receiving pain …
Breastfeeding a toddler is something I never thought I would do. Long before I decided to have children, I knew that I wanted to breastfeed my children for one year. I am not sure how I came to this decision, but when I was around 9 years old, I learned that babies were not supposed …
