I work for you. I will give you all kinds of information about your birth options. I will talk to you about your goals for your birth. I will do research about anything I do not know, and come back to you with all the evidence I can find. I will be there for you if you need to ask any questions during your pregnancy. I will be almost as excited about your impending labor as you are. I will wait anxiously by the phone for the call that might come in the middle of the night to come and join you while you are in labor. I will come to your house, if you want to keep laboring at home or are birthing there. I will follow you to the hospital or meet you as you arrive. I will hold your hand and tell you that everything is going normally, if it is. I will decode any medical-speak you don’t understand and make sure that you are making informed decisions about your care. I will squeeze your hips and try all my tricks to help you stay as comfortable as possible during your labor. I will call the nurse to give you your bolus of fluids for your epidural if that is what you want. I’ll suggest position changes and help you move into them. I will make you go to the bathroom every hour during labor. I will be there with you the entire time. I will help guide you through the entire process, and I will love every minute of it.
I want for you to have the birth that you want to have. I don’t care if you get an epidural; I still have ways that I can help you. If you don’t want an epidural, I know how to get you there too. I want you to leave your birth feeling fulfilled. I want you to feel like you accomplished something, because having a baby is a MAJOR accomplishment no matter how it happens. I want you to feel like you were supported in every decision you made along the way, and that you had all the information to make each one. I want for you to be happy with your birth, exactly how it happened, no matter if it was to plan or not. I want so much for you to completely exhilarated and excited about your birth, so much so that you can’t wait to tell the story to anyone that will listen.
I believe that birth is amazing. There is nothing more exciting than getting to watch a new baby come earth-side. Getting to be a part of that process is what makes the job of a doula so rewarding. I believe in this work and its value. I believe that this job makes a difference not only in the lives of the women we serve, but also in all those that we touch through our service: the nurses and other hospital staff, the physicians, the midwives, the family members, and the friends. I believe that one birth at a time, I am making a difference in the way that birth is viewed and approached. Most of all, I believe that this work is my passion.
Doulas make a difference. Doulas everywhere want to change birth one mother at a time. Doulas are evidence-based.