When I began interviewing doulas more than twenty years ago, I thought I was studying what they did. How did they provide effective labor support? What made their care meaningful to the people they served? But as the research unfolded, [...]
Discussing brain differences is popular right now. Many people—especially those who identify as women or who were assigned female at birth (AFAB)—are discovering that their brain differences fit the description of neurodivergence (ND), rather than having a neurotypical (NT) brain. [...]
Doulas are in a service business. Our success depends largely on how we manage our relationships with others. Many of us have excellent communication skills when things are going well...
DONA International was my organizational home for many years. I was trained by Penny Simkin in 1996 along with my training partners, Karen Kohls, PT, and Ruth Ancheta, MA. By putting our three minds and specialties together...
I'm excited to release the DTD Toolkit for Gaining Entry to Hospitals. It's been in the works for a few months, after two hospitals in my area began accepting my training certificates as legitimate credentials for entry as a birth doula...
COVID19 Podcast for Doulas! Listen to our podcast with all doulas need to know about COVID19, getting into the hospital and the implications for our profession and our clients! Dr. Amy Gilliland has listened to the CDC broadcasts, [...]
Advocacy Resources for Birth, Postpartum, and Palliative Care Doulas on COVID-19 As doulas worldwide prepare for the arrival of coronavirus in their region, many of us are concerned about the ability to support our clients during their birth, [...]
Why Don’t We Have The Doula Research We Need? Part I of IV The Cochrane Collaboration updated their doula research review this year. They added four, only FOUR new studies – and none of them advanced our research [...]
Hospital Agreements: An Opportunity For Engagement [Part II] If a doula agreement is being waved in front of you, congratulations! It means that your doula community has gotten too large to ignore and is having enough of an impact [...]
Doulas Are Paraprofessionals Encouraging professional behavior by doulas is one of the purposes of this blog, but it needs to be clear that the doula occupation is a paraprofession, not a profession. Community based, hospital employed, and independent practice [...]
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