Empowered Birth: Birth & Postpartum Doula Services

New and Expecting Mama’s…Join us on November 9th for an exciting event where you’ll find tons of amazing resources for your pregnancy and motherhood journey! I’m looking forward to seeing everyone there! ❤️

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In honor of Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day, we remember...⁠
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the babies born sleeping,⁠
those we carried but never held,⁠
those we held but could not take home,⁠
and those who came home but could not stay.⁠
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Continuing to pray for Western North Carolina and all areas that were impacted by the hurricane.

It’s been heavy on my heart to help in any way that I can. I’d like to offer doula services to any expecting mama’s that have been displaced by the storms and are now in any of the surrounding Charlotte areas.

If you or someone you know needs extra birth support, please reach out. ❤️

Love receiving updates from clients! Look how much this sweet guy has grown! Makes my Doula heart so happy 🥰

⭐️ It’s World Breastfeeding Week! ⭐️

While breastfeeding is known as “the most natural thing in the world,” it needs to be acknowledged that it doesn’t always come naturally! For a lot of women, their breastfeeding journey includes working through blood, sweat and tears (literally) to feed their babies. Some things we can do to help support new moms in their breastfeeding journey:

• Support them! Sometimes it really can be as easy as telling them they’re doing a good job, getting them something to eat and drink while they’re nursing, cause let’s face facts they’re probably starving/thirsty, and not pushing unhelpful advice or opinions.

• Make trained lactation health professionals more accessible to everyone! Sometimes getting the right kind of help in your breastfeeding journey feels like a full time job. Making lactation professionals more accessible could make all the difference for a breastfeeding mom’s journey!

• Grace! This is for the breastfeeding mama’s currently in the thick of their journey, and the people around them. Give yourselves grace. Every new breastfeeding journey is a learning experience and you’re not expected to know all the things, and get it all right, all the time.

Between both of my girls, I devoted over 3 1/2 years to breastfeeding. It wasn’t always easy, but it was always worth it. No matter how long you breastfeed for; a couple days, weeks, months or years, know that your body is providing exactly what your baby was made to receive.

VBAC Awareness Day!

For those of you who don’t know, VBAC’s are very near and dear to my heart. My second baby, my homebirth baby, was my VBAC baby. After my first baby, who was a scheduled cesarean, I had the mindset that any subsequent children would also be a cesarean having never heard that there were other options. The old saying “once a c-section, always a c-section” could not be further from the truth! I’m so thankful that I educated myself on all things birth before resigning myself to having repeat surgeries for future children. I’m so grateful that cesarean births are an option in those cases where they’re really necessary. Thank goodness we have the technology to allow for safe outcomes in those otherwise dire circumstances. But, myself, like a lot of other women who’ve had cesareans, were not in those dire situations that really constituted a surgical birth. In the US the surgical birth rate is astronomically high compared to what it should be, around 10% of births. It’s time to get educated on your birth options! Mama’s who have had a cesarean and still desire a vaginal birth, please do your research, ask your local birth worker all the questions and advocate for yourself!

I try to stress this information to my clients! Dilation is not a good indicator of what your labor is doing/going to do!

The BEST part of being a Doula 💙

✨They told you about the contractions, but did they tell you about the expansion? Did they tell you how your body would open to make way for the whole universe to pass through? Did they tell you how your heart would explode with a love bigger than anything you’ve ever known as you pulled your baby to your chest?

✨They told you about the ring of fire but did they tell you about the crown of stars? Did they mention that there’s a moment when your baby enters the world and you leave your body and touch the heavens and become the light of a million galaxies? Did they tell you how the pain of stretching to receive your child would be more exquisite than any sensation you’ve felt?

✨They told you you would scream but did they tell you about how would you roar? Did they tell you about the power that would rise up from your belly as you called your baby forth with your mighty voice? Did they tell you how you would embody the wild woman within you as you breathe fire with your song?

✨They told you would bleed, but did they tell you how that sacred blood wouldn’t scare you? How you would feel grateful for that magical liquid of life as it trickled down your leg - how you would honour its flow and how it would help you heal a lifetime of hating your body’s bleeding cycle.

✨They told these stories and taught you to fear birth, to fear your power, to fear yourself. But you are stronger and wiser than that, Mama. You know that birth is your divine dance, your soul’s song, your moment with God, and you walk fearlessly into her open arms.

-Spirit Y Sol

✨Happy International Homebirth Day✨

Back Labor! Who’s experienced it? If you have, you know that back labor is NO JOKE!
Back labor is when contractions are felt primarily in the lower back region, and the pain can even linger between contractions, with no break in between.
Baby’s positioning is the commonly agreed upon reason for women experiencing back labor. When baby is facing up or sunny side up (occiput posterior position) baby’s head/spine is pushing against Mom’s spine. While this is the most commonly agreed upon reason, it’s not correlated well enough to prove that baby’s position causes back labor.
Other reasons why Mom may experience back labor are short torso, bad posture, tight or weak muscles/ligaments, prior back injury, and pelvic shape.
While there’s no infallible way to prevent back labor, there are things that can be done during pregnancy to be proactive! Seeing a chiropractor to keep your pelvis aligned, being mindful of your posture, forward leaning inversions, and other exercises for optimal positioning!
If you do find yourself experiencing back labor there are a few things you can do to try to alleviate it! Movement! Staying upright and allowing gravity to work with you, along with things like pelvic tilts and squats can help with the pain of back labor. Hip squeezes and counter pressure done by your partner and/or doula can also help. Using a tens unit or sterile water injections have also been used to help alleviate the pain of back labor.

It’s World Doula Week!👏🏼 Tag your favorite doulas below to celebrate and tell them thanks for all that they do.

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Purple pushing, also known as coached pushing is when you’re coached to lie on your back, hold your breath and bear down for 10 seconds, back to back. While this tends to be the standard practice, there are a few reasons why you might want to avoid purple pushing.

* Pushing is instinctual. You do not need to be coached on how to push your baby out. Waiting for the FER (fetal ejection reflex) to kick in can greatly improve, and shorten the pushing phase.

* Purple pushing is exhausting. After laboring to get to the pushing phase, and then being directed to hold your breath and bear down over and over and over again, is just exhausting, and pushing in this way can actually draw out the pushing phase.

* Less oxygen for mother and baby! Of course if you’re holding your breath while bearing down, you’re receiving less oxygen, which means less oxygen is getting to your baby. When baby receives less oxygen, this can lead to fetal distress.

* Increased risk of perineal tearing and straining of the pelvic floor. Bearing down when you don’t feel the urge to push, is going to put unnecessary strain on your pelvic floor and can increase the risk of perineal tearing.

So what can you do instead of purple pushing? Follow your instincts! Wait until you feel the need to push, wait for a contraction and try to work with that contraction, exhale while pushing instead of holding your breath. Take an out of hospital CBE Course (childbirth education) to learn the various ways to breathe your baby out, and avoid purple pushing.

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As we approach this Christmas season, I find my thoughts frequently drifting to Mary. Having grown up hearing the story of Jesus’s birth every year during this season, and now having children of my own, I have a new appreciation for Mary and her experience. How lonely must it have been for her? How frightening, to be young and u***d and carrying the Messiah, not knowing what to expect, or what people might think of her. How did she feel when those first labor pains came, and realizing the birth of her child was imminent, with nowhere to go? What stands out to me the most is her unwavering faith! Through it all, Mary’s trust in God, and his plan for her and the child she was carrying, was constant, and to me that is one of the most amazing parts of this story.

When it comes to birth, that’s what it all comes down to. Our trust and faith in our bodies abilities. Trusting that God, in his infinite wisdom, designed our bodies for this exact thing! Conceiving, carrying, birthing and nourishing our babes with our bodies. What a sacred honor we, as women, have been bestowed.

I like to think that every time I have the honor of witnessing a birth that it brings me just a little closer to Mary and her incredible faith! ❤️

Important to keep in mind with the approaching holidays!

Elective induction around a holiday is for convenience, but not yours.

With Thanksgiving & Christmas coming up, loads of unnecessary inductions and c-sections are about to happen.

Every year there is a HUGE decrease in births on (and around)...

🔆 Christmas
🔆 New Year’s Eve/Day
🔆 Easter (changes yearly - first Sunday after the full moon in April)
🔆 Memorial Day (changes yearly - last Monday in May in the US)
🔆 Independence Day (4th of July in the US)
🔆 Thanksgiving (changes yearly - last Thursday in November)

And it’s not just the United States - it's everywhere.

How could it be that all of these holidays have lower birth rates year after year?

It’s not a coincidence - it’s about convenience.

And not YOUR convenience. The convenience of providers.

No one wants to work on holidays, and hospital birth providers have a way to make sure (for the most part) that they don’t have to.

Inductions & c-sections are rarely scheduled ON holidays, but they ARE frequently scheduled in the days leading up to, or just after, a holiday.

If you are due around a holiday, and your provider suggests an induction or c-section, it’s a good idea to question why (remember that you always have the right to decline). If there is NOT a legitimate medical reason, they may be more concerned with being home in time for a holiday dinner than your well being.

For more info and references on this topic, check out my FREE holiday births handout on my website (birthuprising.com/resources).

Happy Halloween!

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Avoid spooky situations like missing out on your preferred Doula by booking early! 2024 is booking up quickly!

Updated Birth Doula Availability! Several availabilities in the next few months, with the first of the year filling up quick! Message, call or text for doula services inquiries!

Happy World Breastfeeding Week!

Whether straight from the breast, or pumping to bottle feed; a day, a week or years, however long, and whatever amounts and methods, your breastmilk benefits your baby!

False!!

This “rule” was first introduced in the 1940’s when general anesthesia was commonly used on woman giving birth, in an attempt to prevent aspiration. It originally came about after a study showed 2 deaths out of 40,000, from aspiration. Even though, statistically, the risk of death from aspiration in low risk laboring women, is about 1 in 6 million! It became a medical precedent, that has been in place for far too long. You may have heard the phrase “labor is a marathon.” And it’s true. And you cannot run a marathon without properly fueling your body. Eat. Drink. Fuel your body. Even in labor.