Meet with your midwife alternately in your home and in her office while comfortably catching up on what you are experiencing each month. Each visit we will answer your questions and get to know each other deeper. Visits can include checking in on your baby’s growth and positioning, checking in on your pregnant body’s health, discussing optimizing your health and supporting your pregnant body with nutrition and movement, answering questions and sharing resources for your physical, emotional, and spiritual journey, lab work and ultrasound referrals as needed, and integration with other practitioners in the community.

Starting at 28 weeks, we begin to see each other every two weeks as we dive deep into setting your intention and plan for the birth. We prepare your space and family for welcoming a baby at home.

Around your 36th week, we have a team meeting with everyone who you invite to attend your birth. This can include doulas, birth photographers, caregivers for older children, any friends or family who you intend to invite for any reason, and the assistant midwife who we choose to help with your birth. We go over everyone’s roles and check out your birth space and the preparations you have made for your birth. This meeting helps us all to witness you and grounds us in the energy that we plan to cultivate for the event.

From then on, we meet up weekly leading up to the arrival of your baby. In this way, we are able to keep track of your growing baby and help you feel completely solid, prepared, and excited about the welcoming of your new family member.

Within your due window, you have access to me 24 hours a day for labor support. As an expert in normal and natural birth, I honor your intuition and expertise in yourself and your baby. You lead the way! I monitor your baby and you during the labor to ensure your health and safety with the least amount of interruption possible. Be in positions that are most comfortable and productive for you. Create the atmosphere that feels most in line with your needs. Eat, drink, and nourish your body as needed. Kiss your partner, get a massage from your best friend, nurse your older baby, take a bath in your bathtub, go for a walk in your backyard… whatever makes you feel supported and loved as you labor. I can provide you with a birthing tub if you are interested in water therapy for labor or water birth for your baby.

As baby arrives, you are invited to interact with your baby, touch their head or even catch your own baby. It is rare that I need to intervene during a birth. And if necessary, my skills, medications, oxygen tank, and equipment are there.

As baby emerges, they go right to you, with little to no intervention. Healthy, unmedicated babies do not need rubbing or drying after birth. No one touches your baby’s cord! Your placenta arrives when it is ready and goes in a bowl or bag right next to you, left attached to complete its journey with your baby. You are given space to get to know your baby in the comfort of your own bed while the midwives unobtrusively keep an eye on everything. Many assessments are done without conversation or manipulation. Someone brings you a warm meal and drink to nourish you as you settle into this new stage of life and get to know this new soul that has emerged.

After everything has settled, generally an hour or more after birth, we perform a full assessment on the baby right next to you and with your participation. We check for tearing and can suture as needed. We help you get up to pee. We help you cut your baby’s cord, or not. We give you instructions for the next 24 hours, and we tuck you into bed. After getting everything in order and cleaning up our equipment or any mess, we slip out and promise to see you the next day.

Home midwifery postpartum care is unmatched in any other model. In the first week after birth, you will see your midwife at least 3 times. We are in communication throughout the week as we support you in your feeding goals and monitor your recovery and your baby’s growth. I believe that it is because of this support that 99% of clients meet their feeding goals and rates of postpartum mood disorders are exceptionally low. By supporting you and your family through this sensitive first week, partnerships are fortified and parents come out with a sense of unwavering confidence in their body and their abilities, as they should!

More visits are added as needed. We see each other again when your baby is around 2 weeks old and finally when you are 6 weeks postpartum. The final visit can include a full pelvic floor assessment and diastasis recti assessment. We also go deep into your emotions and your feelings and thoughts on your birth experience. I support you and your baby to have the most optimal start possible, the way it was intended to be.

The post-postpartum: Although our care officially ends at 6 weeks post birth, I love to stay in contact with the families I work with and enjoy hosting gatherings for families to connect and build community. We support each other as mothers and members of the community. It’s not uncommon for families to share hand me downs, breastmilk, childcare, recipes, and other resources.