Certified Birth Doula – DONA International, certified 8/2023
Certified Lactation Counselor – The Healthy Children’s Project, certified 11/2021
Certifying Childbirth Educator – CAPPA, certified 1/2025
A little about me…
I arrived to my doula career in 2020 after choosing to leave a 15-year career with Whole Foods Market and moving to Durango, CO with my husband and three kids in 2018.
I never imagined that those years in the natural foods industry would have prepared me to be a doula but my, how they have.
Servant leadership was central to the WFM philosophy and I was fortunate to have many incredible mentors who pushed me (often right out of my comfort zone) to learn how to embody this skill. The delicate balance between compassion and assertion, empathy and hard truth – meeting people right where they are to support them on their unique journey.
My doula training was incredibly effective at equipping me with tools and skills to support birthing individuals and couples, but there were a few aspects of this work that it just could not have prepared me for – coupling my doula training with the skill set from my former career seems to be a powerful combination.
I found my doula career in the midst of the chaos and uncertainty of 2020, but it seems like it was always waiting up ahead. Waiting for me to become to the business professional, the servant leader, the active listener, the up-all-nighter, that my former job trained me to be.
I absolutely LOVE this work and feel deeply honored each and every time a couple invites me to share this wondrous experience with them.
Why did I choose to become a doula?
I want to expand the scope of general understanding about birth, and all the various ways a person can choose to birth their baby. There is no wrong choice – there is only what feels right for you. If that choice is honored fully, whether it’s a completely natural childbirth, a home birth, a medically-assisted hospital birth, or a cesarean, then it will be beautiful. My goal as your doula will always be to support with information and care so that no matter the outcome, every client feels seen, heard, and cared for.
I had all three of my babies in a hospital with an epidural, Pitocin, and my water broken artificially. I was very fearful of the perceived pain of childbirth and unaware of the alternative pain relief measures available to me. I did not have a doula. Would I have done birth differently had I been more informed? Probably. Do I feel like my children’s births were any less beautiful because I did them the conventional way? Absolutely not. Don’t get me wrong, we had the music going, doc was feeling it too, and my babies were welcomed into a super happy and stress-free world…I was just tethered to the hospital bed by various medical monitoring devices.
I believe we do the best we can with the information we have and so I intend to provide that information to my clients, with tons of love and zero judgement.
Let’s have a baby!
Animas Birth Doula 