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Doulas help mothers through birth experience
Photo by Steven St. JohnTribune
Tribune
Certified doula Amity Johnson hands out cards to expectant parents, including Lakshman Garvin and Tehya Shea (far left) and Helen Maestas (to the couple's right) during a class at Body, Mind & Spirit, a childbirth and family resource center at 123 Wellesley Dr. S.E. Doulas aid parents before and during the birthing experience.
BABY STEPS
Making a baby? Here are some thoughtful ways to mark this life-cycle transition beyond a baby shower.
Mother blessing: A group of female friends and relatives gather to offer insights and best wishes to the woman who is about to become a mother. Two ideas:
Each woman brings a bead to create a necklace that the mother wears during labor, bringing together the supportive energy of loving women.
At the gathering, each woman decorates a square of fabric to make a string of prayer flags that can be unrolled in the birthing room, providing a visual reminder of their love and support.
Poetry shower: If you don't need material items and want to discourage consumerism, have a gathering where the guests bring a poem or other reading related to birth.
Birth bundle: Find three special objects that represent the energies of the mother, the father and the baby. Tie them inside a piece of cloth, knotting firmly, but not too tight. In the midst of labor, the objects can come out and be viewed or held as a reminder of strength.
Tree planting: New parents may be too busy or tired to plant a tree when a baby arrives, but relatives can undertake the task to mark the new life in the family so everyone can chart the growth in both human and plant life.
Yemeni 40-day celebration: In the Yemen culture, a mother does no household work for 40 days after she has given birth. She simply nurses the baby and recovers. On the 40th day, she is celebrated at a tea party and treated like a queen before resuming ordinary life.
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When Adam and Eve were evicted from the Garden of Eden, God told Eve that she and all women to come would bear their children in pain. It's too bad Eve didn't have a doula to help her in labor.
Doula is the Greek word for a female servant, but is now describes a woman who attends to the mother and her partner before, during and after labor and delivery. Doulas, most of whom are mothers themselves, provide nonmedical labor assistance, including knowledge to help dispel fears, and physical and emotional support.
"It's like having your mother, grandmother and aunt in the room with you, saying, `Have you had enough to drink? Have you had something to eat?' " says Meg Rey-Bear, an Albuquerque mother of two girls who were born with doula assistance.
With its history as a growing town in a frontier state, Albuquerque saw many births aided by grandmothers, nuns and midwives. Today, doctors, nurses and midwives in the city's birthing centers at Presbyterian, Lovelace Sandia and University of New Mexico hospitals are generally open to having doulas assist the family and work well with them.
"Albuquerque is such a great place to have babies because we've got progressive doctors," says Erika Harding, a doula and founder of the Body, Mind & Spirit Childbirth and Family Resource Center. "There's really a very receptive birthing and parenting community here."
Harding has helped with more than 150 births over eight years. She holds monthly teas at the center to introduce expectant parents to local doulas and explain how they can help.
Many couples who choose to engage the services of a doula are seeking natural childbirth, with minimal medical intervention, no Caesareans and limited or no drugs.
Expectant parents who are busy making plans for what happens after the baby comes may not stop to think about what they want the actual birth experience to be like. Doulas help mothers envision their fantasy birth scenario, and work as circumstances allow to make that vision a reality.
"I wanted to do it as naturally as possible, never having been through it," said Dwenna Nelson, 32.
After more than 24 hours of labor, though, when the second doula showed up to relieve the first, Nelson said, "I was begging for drugs."
But the second doula directed her to refocus her energy and relax and coached her to help her understand what was happening in her body. Nelson got through the rest of the delivery without drugs.
"Labor is misportrayed as brutal, unmanageable, devastatingly painful suffering," Harding says. "I teach how to make the pain manageable. A big part of birth is letting go of expectations. With support, desire, interest and luck, you can have a positive birth experience."
When expectant parents hire a doula, they start with a prenatal appointment to discuss their birth experience visions and desires. After labor starts and progresses, the doula may come to the home and accompany the mother to the hospital or birthing center, and she stays with her the entire time through delivery. Many doulas work in teams or with a backup to cover those labors that stretch over 24 hours. They follow up with a postnatal visit a few weeks afterward, checking in and bringing information the new mother may need.
"Women have been giving birth for thousands of years without doctors, without medicine, and having midwives and doulas is about bringing it back to its roots," says Rey-Bear. "It's better for the moms to be supported by women who know what it's like to be in that room, struggling with that pain."
But doulas aren't just for women. Having dads in the birth room is a fairly recent development, and his presence carries a heavy burden to help. The doula does many things to support both the mother and her partner. For example, if the dad needs a break to go to the restroom or get something to eat, or gets faint observing the miracle of birth, the doula can continue to support the mother.
"It really made a difference just having her in the room and knowing that there was someone with us continuously who had this vast experience of birth and knew what to expect and how things tended to go," says Kathy Hickner, who gave birth to two sons with doula assistance.
Debra Heath, who had a son and a daughter with the aid of a doula, says, "It's like having a guide through the process. We could focus on ourselves and someone else was thinking about the details, making sure that everything was OK."
Some of those details include things like providing warm compresses, a shoulder massage and encouraging words, making sure the mother is well-hydrated, taking pictures to document the birth, and getting dinner for everyone afterward.
The birthing process also transforms a woman into a mother, a huge shift in her role in life.
"Becoming a mother is the greatest life change a woman can experience," says Harding. "We are so self-oriented, recipients of care, and all of a sudden, with a baby, that relationship is turned on its head."
Heath, who gave birth at ages 38 and 42, says she turned into a big worrywart when she became pregnant. She's now very focused on living in the moment rather than planning way ahead.
"Being a mother is a humbling experience," she says. "It helps that I had a full life before I became a mother, but it's so pathetic. I need to go to bed by 9:30 now."
Rubin is an Albuquerque resident and event planner writing a how-to book on creating memorable life-cycle events.
