Get to know Kayla: Birth Work as Life Work
Hi, I'm Kayla, a passionate Doula and Birth Worker, and I'm here for you.
My passion is fueled by your journey to and through motherhood. It is my joy to partner with you and yours to maximize the enlightenment and empowerment you deserve to experience as your personal family story is written.
"But Kayla, you don't even know me...and I'm just getting to know you!"
Well, please do read on, as I'd love for us to become acquainted!
My connection to pregnancy, childbirth, and new life is innate. As a young girl I was always eager to gaze at, hold, and care for babies, as many girls are, but I also recall maintaining a unique reverence and respect for new mothers. I curiously attempted to make sense of the process of women bearing and bringing forth new life. If a woman could perform such a miracle, it only made sense that she be honored and admired.
Jump with me to college life, where I studied to become a Registered Nurse. If you're guessing my ambition was to work in Labor and Delivery, let me pause you there (I actually only aspired to work in Pediatrics). While most of my nursing cohort studied, certified, and worked as Nurses Aids, I sought work at our university's childcare center, specifically in the infant classroom. The determination of the student mothers who juggled classes, study groups, and parenting impressed and humbled me. Loving on their little ones felt like a win-win on both sides.
The summer after freshman year, I flew across the country to volunteer at Maggie's Place: A two-month stretch cohabitating in a "safe housing and nurturing community for homeless pregnant women, empowering them to thrive through their lifetime." Again, this was a symbiotic experience: continuous support for mothers, and all sorts of life-experiences for me. A first-time mother invited me to witness the birth of her son while at Maggie's Place, an invitation I did not take for granted, and an experience I still reflect on to this day. Living amongst Maggie's Place moms and staff opened my eyes to the necessity of hands-on support through the entire antepartum and postpartum experience. Mama's, we need each other!
It was time to hit the books hard when I returned to college in the Fall, so formal studies took place of my life-experience work regarding expectant mothers. Wouldn't you know it, though, when ample "free-time" reappeared the following summer, I spent it researching birth stories and documentaries, just for fun, ha (A million thanks to the creators of "The Business of Being Born" for sparking thoughtful decision-making within my impressionable mind)!
I assume you're catching on by now: birth work has always captivated my heart, and soul, but I didn't necessarily make time for it while chasing other pursuits. In hindsight, it's fun to realize how my passion stayed alive, and I do not have regrets about diversions from my true lifework. I actually can see how each monumental life choice has prepared me for my current pursuits, and that feels providential.
Several years after college, my husband and I were thrilled to learn we were expecting our first baby. At the time, I did the best I could to prepare myself for my own pregnancy, labor, and birth journey. More than anything else I wanted to feel connected to the process I'd been so curious about my whole life. I attended appointments with my hospital-based midwife team, and I read birth story after birth story (shout out the the legendary Ina May Gaskin and her extensive wisdom in Ina May's Guide to Childbirth) with the thought that if I familiarized myself with the childbirth process, then fear, uncertainty, and confusion would dwindle away.
And it did.
My first labor started very "textbook," and progressed just as our birth education instructor said it would. My top takeaway from all of my personal preparations was to stay open-minded, trust the process, and remain in the present moment. As labor intensified, I reminded myself that I didn't need to look back, or ahead, and I remained steadfast to only bear what was required of me minute by minute. This simple, yet solid belief carried me all the way through to transition. My body's natural ability combined with stellar support from my husband and birth team equipped me to endure the final pushes that brought my daughter to my arms. Labor and delivery were NOT easy, yet despite the intensity, I always reflect back with feelings of empowerment, pride, and joy. See future posts about my individual birth stories; I'll be delighted to share.
Now, since we're getting to know each other, I would like to emphasize that I am a woman of connection: I want to see you, know you, understand you, and I want to be seen, known, and understood. After my birth I wanted to share my birth story with anyone and everyone who would listen. I had high hopes of connecting with other women over our unique right-of-passage stories, and reveling in the truth that we got to experience the miracle of bearing and bringing forth new life in our own families.
Friends, have you experienced that?
Conversations where you connected with women in a celebratory, awe-inspired, reflective time of sharing stories of intense perseverance, surrender, and triumph in the childbirth process? If you have, you understand what it's like to walk away from those conversations inspired, encouraged, and empowered.
And if you haven't, then you have experienced what I did as a first-time mom. My hopes of connecting with other women were often met with inverted narratives: reflections that emphasized confusion, anger, pain, and dissatisfaction, if they even chose to share their childbirth story at all. One mother even claimed "PTSD" related to her birth, despite a fairly normal sequence of events during the labor and vaginal delivery of her son. She described feeling disconnected from what was happening within her own body, and dissatisfied with the treatment by those attending her delivery. I had discovered negative childbirth narratives while reading birth stories on the internet before my own delivery, but it was particularly painful to hear this theme prevail in the lives of my loved ones. I began to examine and question: why?
-Why are feelings of hesitation, fear, and dissatisfaction surrounding childbearing and childbirth present? And, why do they remain present despite better education and tools at our fingertips?
-Why are women not feeling safe, equipped, and empowered to experience childbirth?
-Why does our culture consider negative narratives surrounding childbirth acceptable as "the way it is," especially considering birth immediately precedes motherhood (a season in which we continually strive for positive personal narratives, rightfully so)?
I've spent the last several years trying to make sense of where we are as a culture when it comes to childbearing and childbirth. What I have found is that connection is the missing common denominator in most circumstances.
-Connection to birth history (oh, it matters, friend)
-Connection to women who admire, appreciate, and even revere pregnancy and the birth process
-Connection to resources and providers of excellent, truthful quality
-Connection to our unique innate childbirth wisdom
I communicate this realization with confidence. In dozens of conversations, thought-provoking questions, connections to high-quality resources, and sharing positive birth stories serve as catalysts for women reconnecting to their innate childbirth wisdom. Revelation of choices, which are more vast than standard obstetric materials lead us to believe, is the outcome of our conversing.
Again and again, women and their families discern, then act upon personalized choices, and experience empowerment in their own journey to and through motherhood. It truly is my greatest joy to witness such transformation.
I invite you to be here.
To belong here. At My Birth Choices, I have a mission to reconnect mothers to innate wisdom and maximize their empowerment in pregnancy, childbirth, and beyond through the revelation of choice. Executing choice is simple, yet profound, and it makes all the difference.
So, friend, what do you say? Will you choose to go forward with me toward a culture of enlightened and empowered mothers and families? I sincerely hope you do.
Here for you,
