Why I Became A Doula~My Story
As I’ve been going through this process of becoming a doula, some of my friends and my family have been asking, “well, why why are you becoming a doula?” so I thought I would share a little bit of my story with you and why it is that I want to be a doula to help other women through their pregnancy, through their birth, and through the postpartum time.
When I first became pregnant with my oldest daughter, over eleven years ago, I started to really think about what it meant to have a baby. All the information I had about birth was really just from movies. Scene: The water breaks dramatically, and the husband rushes to the hospital where the woman gets hooked up to an epidural, and three minutes later she has a baby. End scene. It’s all very dramatic. It’s all very quick. It’s all very unrealistic, unfortunately. So I started just reading. I was reading a lot about what what birth actually looks like in real life, and started talking to some of my friends who had babies.
I came across an acquaintance. Her name was Jess, but I haven’t been in contact with her for about 10 years. I don’t even know what she’s doing now, but she changed the trajectory of my life. She just talked to me a little bit about her natural birth. That blew me out of the water. I had never heard of anyone having a natural birth. I really just thought you went to the hospital and did what the doctor told you to to do.
After hearing Jess’s story, I started looking into what normal birth looks like, what my options were, what my choices were. I started questioning everything. Do I have to do everything the doctor says? Do I have to get hooked up to this epidural? Do I have to even give birth at a hospital?
After reading and researching, I made a lot of different decisions. I have this wild and crazy birth story that I may share someday, but not today. Before that though, through the process I decided to have a birth doula for my labor and delivery. I actually came across a doula team that worked together, and they both ended up attending my birth. They really were instrumental in how I handled things, with positioning and different things I could do to cope with the the sensations that I was feeling through my labor.
Through my birth process and learning everything that I did, I kind of became a birth junky. I love reading birth stories and listening to other women talk about how they gave birth to their babies. Two years prior to this I was actually able to be a part of my sister’s birth with her oldest daughter. It kind of happened by accident, but my sister allowed me to stay in the delivery room when she pushed her baby out. By far it was one of the most amazing experiences I’ve ever had. I never ever ever wanted to be a nurse, but in that moment I thought I could be an OB nurse. That was such a miraculous moment, just watching that baby emerge into the world. Because of that experience as well as my own birth experience, I fell in love with birth and hearing birth stories.
After my oldest daughter was about was about a year old, I decided I was going to become a doula. I looked into some different training organizations, and I eventually signed up to go to a training in Chicago. I was all ready to go and so excited about it. Then I found out I was rather unexpectedly pregnant. For whatever reason, at that time, in my mind, I decided that it just wasn’t a good fit for me to to be pregnant and go through the doula training at that point. So I put it off.
With my second baby, I also had a doula. Her name is Maren, and she is with Wonderfully Woven Births in the Cincinnati area. If you are in or around Cincinnati and wanting a doula, get her. She’s awesome! Maren really helped me process through my first birth and what I needed to change for my second baby. Even then afterwards, she helped me through processing my second birth as well. She helped educate me in all the choices I needed to make during my labor and my birth, and she was very helpful in those moments when I was so emotional and, and one point, distraught. Maren helped calm me down, identify my options, and told me to choose what was right for me and my baby. She really empowered me to make the decisions I needed to make throughout my birth.
That was almost 9 years ago; my second baby is going to be nine! Throughout those last 10 years basically, in the back of my head, I just thought “One day. One day. One day I’ll be a doula. One day.” Don’t we all do that about something? Please tell me I’m not alone.
About a month ago someone very very dear to me, someone I love very much said to me, “Hey, I know you know about this doula stuff. I really would like to have a doula attend my birth. Would you know anybody in my area?” I started thinking about it, thinking that maybe I could attend her birth. Over the past 10 years I have attended a few births as, as one friend called me, a “foula (fake doula).” I offered support to those mamas as much as I could without knowing all the tricks of the trade.
So this person that I love asked if I knew anyone, and I said, “You know, I do know someone if you’re willing to be a little outside the box. I’m not trained, but I would love to support you through your labor and birth.” She was very receptive to that and said that, yes, she would love for me to be her doula, I was exactly who she had in mind. That, of course, made me feel very good and special.
Later I had a conversation with my husband about this wild and crazy dream of mine of being a doula. He told me to go after it. He said I had been dreaming of this for over ten years, and instead of being her fake doula, I should be her real doula. Finally then I decided that, yes, that was exactly what I wanted to do.
Starting out, I was so nervous because my little guy is only ten months now. He was about five or six months old as I was making this decision. I was wondering how I was going to make this work around my little guy and my other children as well. I found Birth Arts International and have done my training through them, online. There are a few more pieces that I need to do with the training process, mostly the business side of the of the training. So far becoming a doula has been an amazing experience. I am really excited to continue through the certification process.
So, that’s it. That is my story. I am looking forward to partnering with families and serving them as I continue this story.
Jenn Mandura is a Birth and Postpartum Doula in Central and Northeast Indiana. She strives to educate and empower her clients to have the birth and postpartum experience that they desire. Jenn enjoys yoga, donuts, and hiking with her husband and four kiddos. You can find out more about the services Jenn offers here. She would love to connect with you on facebook here. Or feel free to contact her.