The Journey Begins

Hello! Thank you for coming to check Beyond Measure Doula Services out. Here you will be able to find posts about everything birth related, from my birthing experiences, to pain management, to other people’s experiences and more. To start, this very first post is about why I want to be a Doula and what I hope to be able to do as a Doula.

Growing up I always wanted to be a mom. I remember knowing  at a young age that babies grow in your tummy, you go to the hospital, push and voila, you have a baby. If only it was that simple, right? Well as I grew up, I would hear people talking about this scary thing called labour and when I  was about 12 years old, along with learning about the birds and the bees, I also learned about how babies come into the world. It didn’t scare me off having babies, but I was definitely unsure about this labour thing.  I heard someone say once, that they didn’t feel their babies being birthed as they were numb and as high as a kite on pain medication. I was 15 years old, babies weren’t in my immediate future, but I thought this sounded wonderful, and the perfect way to birth babies and that’s how I wanted to birth my babies.

When I was 20, a good friend of mine became pregnant, was planning a home birth, and had a midwife. This was surprising to me, as I had never really thought that there was any other way to have a baby, other than with a doctor  in the hospital. And all the things I knew about birth were kind of scary as well, the blood test, the checking of the you know what area, and of course the unknown scary dark cloud in my mind that was labour. I was excited for her, and though her labour and birth did not go exactly as planned, it started the process of changing how I actually thought of birth.

A few years later, my husband and I had a beautiful, healthy baby girl. Birthed in the hospital, with an epidural (I will post a whole story on by daughters birth later) and with an OB. My friend had been texting me with words of encouragement through the beginning of my labour, as she had just completed her training as a Doula. I again had never heard of this kind of care being available for birthing people, and I was interested. Some of the words she said and how she said it was great in getting me through pre-labour to active labour. She was unfortunately 6 hrs away in Sudbury, and I was in Niagara Falls at the time, so she was unable to be there. But it planted a seed in my mind, and it grew over the years. Talking to her about her experiences and knowing how I had been very naive about birth in general, hadn’t really known my rights (not that any were violated, or that I was unhappy with my birth experience), and I had gone into my daughter’s birth basically only knowing where the baby would come out, and that it would hurt!

A few year later, I gave birth to my son, again at a hospital, but this time with midwives, and no medical pain management at all. Again my friend was unable to come act as my Doula, as we were still 6 hrs away and she had a new baby. But I could see exactly where she would have fit into my birth story, and how I would have benefited from her.

I decided after my son’s birth that I wanted to become a Doula. I want to be able to help people, who, like me, may have been scared by the way others have talked about their birth stories, or even the media’s take on labour and delivery. I want people to know that they have rights in this, and they are allowed to dream about how their baby is born. That they are in control, and able to achieve a non-traumatic birth, full of love, strength and joy. One that makes them feel proud, and amazed at their bodies. Whether it is a home water birth or a C-section.  Just a change in ones mindset, can make a huge difference in the birthing experience, and I hope that I can help with that.

Birth is not an emergency, it is a natural, beautiful part of life, and my hope is to help the transition from being pregnant, to holding your baby, be as wonderful and as smooth as possible. I love this quote from a well known midwife named Ina May Gaskin;

“Remember this, for it is as true as true gets:  Your body is not a lemon. You are not a machine.[…]Human female bodies have the same potential to give birth well as aardvarks, lions, rhinoceri, elephants, moose, and water buffalo.  Even if it has not been your habit throughout your life so far, I recommend that you learn to think positively about your body.”  -Ina May Gaskin

For those who have stuck with me to the end of this post. Thank you, so much, for reading and I hope that, through others blog post and other information, that I will be able to slowly help you think differently about birth, which will perhaps help those around you change their perspective on birth as well.

If you are in Sudbury, and are pregnant and looking for a Doula. My friend whom I mentioned more than once is Margaret, and you can find her Doula Business here.

For more information on Ina May, and the talks she’s done and the books shes written click here.