When I first found out that I was pregnant with my first born I realised that there was so much that I didn’t know about pregnancy and birth. Being the oldest of my family I’d never seen anyone go through the transition before so it felt like stepping into a completely different world. I decided that I needed to learn as much as I could and understand my options when it came to navigating this journey and so I devoured every natural pregnancy and birthing book I could find, totally in awe of everything that I was learning.
I had two amazing private midwives, a wonderful pregnancy and incredible natural birth. What I was not prepared for was what came after the birth. The fourth trimester, my transition to motherhood. I struggled with feeding and sleeping issues and although I had great support I felt totally overwhelmed. This was all so new to me and looking back now I was under prepared. I see this over and over again and have such a strong desire to help women feel empowered and confident not only during pregnancy and birth but also during the post partum period too because this is often the most difficult period to navigate.
After graduating from Naturopathy I found myself working at a private midwifery center and it was there that I was introduced to the doula profession. I became friends with two doulas in particular who where both very passionate and leading the way with their inspiring work with women. I was very intrigued and keen to learn more, especially since being pregnant for the first time. Although I decided to stick with my plan of having two private midwives support me at a birth center, doula work was still something that was close to my heart and felt would somehow play a role in my life further down the track.
When my eldest was three I enrolled to study midwifery, inspired by the midwives who supported me and the work they where doing at the center. After six months I decided to leave as it just didn’t feel like the right time. It was tricky balancing motherhood with growing my Naturopathy business and I had no idea how I was going to manage the impending placements at hospitals.
A little later, still drawn to birth, I looked at doing my doula training with Rhea Dempsey. Not once but twice I got her to mail out the enrolment form but something was still holding me back. I wanted to support mothers but did I really want to attend births? Is it really for me? Not long afterwards I was introduced to the work of Julia Jones, the creator of Newborn Mothers. Julia is a Post Partum Doula from Western Australia. The instant I found her work I fell in love. I loved how her work was about preparing mothers for post partum, which from my own experience was a more intense time than childbirth itself.
I thought back to my own experience after childbirth. I had prepared so much for the birth, had an incredible birthing experience but really struggled in that post partum period. I really didn’t feel prepared. So many of the mothers that I had connected with since had also felt the same. We all where having a tough time transitioning to motherhood.
This was it. This was how I wanted to support mothers. I had already been attracted to all things pregnancy, birth and beyond and had known that I wanted to support mothers beyond my current scope of Naturopathic practice but at heart I didn’t really feel called to actually attend births, not at this stage of my life anyway. Instead, I wanted to help prepare women for the fourth trimester and to help them navigate what is often the most difficult year of a mothers life, that first year as a new mother.
Not only was Julia passionate about post partum care and mothering the mother but she also had extensive knowledge about the neuro changes that occur in a new mothers brain as well as global post partum practices. Having always had a fascination for psychology and other cultures I was keen to know what other cultures secrets where to caring for mothers and what we where doing wrong in the west which was resulting in such high rates of post natal depression. Julia also has a background in Ayurveda and once again, being a Naturopath and having done extensive self study in Ayurveda since travelling to India (and lugging back a whole suitcase full of books) I felt like this was where my most important work was to be found.
So after engaging with Julias content about post partum care for over a year and purchasing her Newborn Mothers Cookbook, when I saw that she was opening enrolments for her Post Partum Doula Training it was one big YES from me! I bit the bullet and dove in, even though I didn’t really know what to expect or how I was going to incorporate the work into my current skillset as a Naturopath.
Since then things have gone leaps and bounds and I have loved teaching all things post partum preparation and supporting mothers including my one on one sessions, workshops. My particular focus is on herbal medicine and nutrition due to my background but no matter your skill set and experience post partum work is so varied and unique! I know women who in their post partum work love to focus on body work such as pelvic floor recovery and massage, others who love to cook nourishing post partum meals and others who have a special interest in maternal mental health.
So if you feel called to work in this area like myself then I encourage you to take the leap and enroll in Julias next intake round which opens this week. You can jump on the waitlist to find out more and get on board when the doors open!
We need more post partum proffessionals supporting women transition to motherhood. Will you join us?
Jump on the waitlist here!